Offers over - what to offer?

[mareep]

NC for this one.

Property was originally listed at £635,000, didn't sell and has been relisted with a new agent for offers over £550,000. We have a list of criteria with large facing south garden at the top of the list and this one is massive. Been following the market for a couple of years, and possibly one other property which meets our criteria has come up.

EA has said there has been 6 viewings so far, what would you offer? We are going to view today and may offer at the viewing as long as we don't see any red flags.

Ask the EA what he thinks it will go for and offer under that. In honesty you have to start somewhere and if there are no offers on the table then you can offer what you like; it's nothing more than a start point for negotiations. The market is not what it was several months ago and has become a buyers market so you have a strong position already

£560,000? £550,000? The owner will have a ball park figure. It’s not sold. It’s reduced a lot. You need to suss outbid they a desperate to sell or moderately keen! Build up the offers if they reject to your maximum. Don’t go over that. What is it worth to you?

We offered £1k over when we saw offers over.

Don’t offer at the viewing - it gives the impression that you are desperate for the place and they might try to play you on that basis.

I would push your luck with your first offer. As PPs have said, it’s become more of a buyers market and you can afford to push it a bit, especially if they’ve had to reduce the price.

We are progressing our purchase at the moment and, after some really good advice, we secured the place for where we would have pitched our initial offer. So we would have started at 500k for example and been willing to go up to 570k (asking price 560k) but we were told to start lower. We started at 470k and sale agreed at 500k.

Im sure others will be outraged by our situation but it’s saved us a ton of money and the seller wasn’t forced to agree the sale so I don’t feel bad about being a bit cheeky!

Buying houses is ridiculous money - be as cheeky as you can get away with!!

I would start by offering the ‘offers above’ price and see what they came back with.

But be prepared to negotiate up to what you genuinely would expect to be a good price, and that you can afford.

I ignore the 'offers over' bit. If you like it either open negotiations about 15k less than your max or start at your max and say that is your best and final. And stick to it.

Also there is more to an offer than price.

Be clear about your proceedability: AIP / own house under offer with v short chain or to FTB / chain free (in rental or whatever) / no lender needed, purchase will be from current equity and savings / willingness and ability to work with vendors preferred timescale. Anything that makes you a strong buyer.

Thanks all

My husband though potentially going in at 590 would be a good place to start, as he doesn't want to miss out or start a bidding war. I don't either, and if pushed we could pay the 635, but don't want to overpay just because we really like it and think 590 is a little high to start.

@Loofah01 excellent point about asking what he thinks it will go for.

Definitely don't start at 590

I would go and view it first if you haven't already.

If there were no takers at 635k, no way would I go in with 590k. See if you have competition first.

How does the property compare with others for sale/sold recently in the area in terms of price, condition etc? If it didn't sell with the last agent it was clearly either a) very overpriced, b) not as desirable a property as it might appear or c) a bit of both.

A few years ago we were selling a rather unusual property and first agent we used seemed to price it without much consideration for it's less desirable features (they were very pushy and adamant that they would be able to sell it within weeks for that price which was what we wanted to hear but not true). The next agent advised us to market it as 'offers over £[significantly less than before]' so that it would come up on rightmove searches for people with a smaller budget but would not necessarily look as obvious to anyone who had seen it before that it was horribly over priced before. We would have been happy to take the new price as asking price tbh.

@Loofah01

Definitely don't start at 590

Agreed. Way too high.

I think that's the hardest thing, there hasn't been much comparable on the market.

There was a 60s house which also met our criteria which was listed for offers over 590, it sold before we had a chance to view it (sold within 3 days). It was on a quiet cul de sac, this is on a main road but has period features.

There isn't a lot to compare making finding a fair price difficult.

"Offers Over" is inducing a bidding war! That is why they are doing it. Either you engage with that or you do not. What your husband suggests might work and see off the opposition because the vendors bite your hand off. Or, there might be someone else who is prepared to bid up to £600,000 and you still have to see them off! The vendor might keep both of you bidding. It is up to them unless someone pulls out. They might not accept £590,000 and take it off the market. They might of course!

Offering way over to begin with means you have money to burn. The cendors might come back to youy and ask for more to securte it. You must know your limit. If it is £590,000 then donot bid that immediately. You willhave nowhere to go. Therefore, I would hold off doing that but ensure the agent keeps you in loop to make counter offers if necessary. It really depends if you can afford to throw money away to try and stop bids. It will also depend on the position of any other bidders.

So how was the viewing?

Depends on what the market is like where you are and how fairly you think the house is priced now.

We’ve been looking since last summer and had to move into rented. My DH regrets that the house we put our house on the market for back then (sold quickly as priced low to move fast) was on the market on a range and we went in lower to start with. We ended up in a bidding war at higher than the range but still didn’t get it.

The next house we offered in a couple of months ago we went in at the offers over price, ended up at 7% over that price and still didn’t get it.

The house we are buying came on the market, we booked the next day we were at the end of the day of appointments. We made an offer by leaving a message on the estate agents phone and sending a message on the drive home. The house was on the market for £775k. we knew they wanted a fast sale. They hadn’t asked for offers over but we thought the house was worth £800k-£825k based on another house which had sold in a day (and another house which has been on the market at £875k but not shifted as it is overpriced, it’s probably worth £750) we have been watching the market and doing lots of digging.
we offered just over £800k.
The house had 7 offers from the viewings that day. They said that ours was the first and the highest. Someone else revised their offer within a day but the decision had already been made.

(I think the revised offer was higher than ours but conditional on completing before 30 June which isn’t convenient for the vendors)

I definitely would ignore ‘offers over’ for a first bid. I remember the agent trying to persuade us of using that just to soften the blow of reducing the asking price.

Be clear to yourself what you would pay-but if you’re interested this will also depend on what other interest there is-or isn’t-in the house and how keen they are to sell.

Not knowing other interest or owner intent, I’d still go under 550 as a first offer just to get a feel of their response/get the agent to say anything re other offers.

Or you offer the 550 as a ‘ready to go/can get this moving quickly if they accept quickly etc’.