Has anyone used a buying agent??

[McGolmez]

Myself and DH are looking to move out of city (central london) to suburbs as lockdown has highlighted that we need space to WFH and have a garden for our DS.

We've stumbled upon Hither Green as an option (we don't have any family here in UK and friends are scattered) as the daily commute back into the city seems doable... and property prices seem to be reasonable although they've crept up since the stamp duty holiday came in :(

We have spent the past few weeks walking around Hither Green trying to learn about the neighbourhood, what roads appeal to us etc etc - unfortunately there seem to be lots of ppl in the same boat as us and we've missed out on a few houses when it comes to best and final bid so wondering if anyone has used a buyers agent to source a house on your behalf?

Our budget is c£650k for a 3 bed period house so unsure if a buyers agent is traditionally for the upper end of the market but throwing it out there as we really just want to find a house, save the heartache of going back and forth with offers and just make the move!

The other wish is for Kirsty and Phil to magically come onboard and help us out and find the dream house, lol!

Anyway, if anyone has any thoughts to share I'd be interested to get some insight whether it's good, bad, indifferent - thanks in advance MN!

Have you registered with local agents? Get on to Stanford, Winkworth etc and let them know your budget. It's such a popular area due to all the Ofsted outstanding primary schools and lovely parks. Lee is nice too.

We have had "relocation consultants" for corporate moves before. To be honest, the main benefit for us was having someone find houses for us to view in areas we didn't necessarily know very well. They didn't really advise us on what to offer. I guess if you want someone to do the negotiation for you then that is a separate matter and I'd have to trust them 100% not to be in cahoots with the agents. Others may have used that type of service before.

@rilletteyes I blitzed all the local agents about 2 weeks ago and I saw some traction after that, hopefully some new stock comes on soon but you're right HG has become super popular

@Chevron123 to be honest that's what we want - someone who knows the area well and has a relationship with local agents - we can advise about houses we've placed bids on and outline the general vicinity we want to be within HG so they can source the houses for us - we're happy to negotiate ourselves as we know what we can afford and are willing to spend rather than get caught in a high demand / low supply situation that's forcing prices up - worst case we'll end up renting in HG if we have to until things settle but was curious to get some insight on so thank you both!