How can I pitch accepting an offer without ours being on the market?

[FTEngineerM]

Is there even a way?

We’re going to see what is essentially our dream house Monday and ours can’t go on the market until after Christmas now. The estate agent was pretty pumped about our house and lots are selling quickly where we are for asking price too.

But obviously to the sellers of the house we’re viewing it may not be so appealing..

What’s the done thing? How can I make us sound more appealing 😂?

Honestly your only chance would be to offer significantly over the asking price but it is high risk- they may still refuse to take the property off the market and just use it as a bartering tool to other buyers to make them offer higher. The other thing would be to put your house on the market with the same agent selling the property who will back up your claims that yours will sell quickly (and it’s in their interest for you to buy the other house too) or to try to get a bridging loan agreed in principle so that technically you’re proceedable but again a cash buyer would probably still be more attractive. I would get yours on ASAP at a reasonable price and hope no-one offers on the dream house in the meantime.

Just put yourself in their place. If you were selling, and keen to move quickly, would you even entertain an offer from someone who hadn't had an offer accepted on a house? I doubt it. An offer when you haven't sold is like offering Disney money, it's kind of pointless and wastes their time, unless it's an unusual or expensive house and they don't have any other interest.

If I was the seller I wouldn't let you view it. My main stipulation is that you are on the market, at least.

It completely comes down to the seller. Some will only consider proceedable and you can't really do anything about that. Some haven't found anywhere to buy so are happy to have a bit of breathing space while they look.

No harm in trying but definitely put your offer in writing explaining how fast your house should sell and how much you love their house. Putting your house for sale with the same agent will also help massively. I've been shocked at how much sway EAs have with some sellers. Don't underestimate how much having the EA in your corner counts when the seller is considering offers.

I agree with others, I wouldn't take your offer seriously I'm afraid and would only let you view if I had a property I was struggling to sell. All you can really do in a really high bid and hope they are not in a rush to move.

Oh crap 😭

I’m really frustrated because our hands are tied now over the Christmas period, unless we choose a different estate agents that have houses lingering for sale for yonks which I absolutely don’t want to do.

Ok thanks all, I will just hope nobody puts an offer in 😬

Like every single sale, it will depend on the individual people involved.
All you can do is put the offer in, with a lovely letter explaining how you absolutely love the house and are, as you speak putting your on the market just to buy theirs, and that you can evidence that others like yours are selling very quickly.

I mean, if I were selling, I would still take offers from someone who was ready to proceed over someone who isn't, but, at the moment, you don't know that they have other offers from proceedable buyers, so they might still be interested, or, at least they know they can come back to you if they accept another offer which then falls through.

As others have said being with the same EA would help. But you aren’t really in a position to be offering as yours isn’t even on the market let alone under offer.

If I was the seller I would not entertain your offer until you were able to proceed but if you offer over and back up with a letter you could stand a slim chance.

I have moved recently, I instructed the EA that we would not allow any viewers that were not in a position to proceed. I hope not, but I fear you are setting yourself up for upset.

I think so too @Roselilly36 we had the valuations done and the agent we chose I said I’ll get in touch in the new year for photos so that the decorations are down so I thought I’d have a mooch at what we could afford and then.. the. Next. Day. This house pops up so we call to view🤦🏽‍♀️

The agent didn’t ask what position we were in though. I’m hoping that means they may not be in a rush

You could try listing with the EA that's selling the dream house? Might give them more incentive to get it on the market quickly as they'd potentially get two sales out of it.

Or call the other agent and say you want to list immediately as you've found somewhere?

I was offered £75k over asking by a couple who had their house on the market but not under offer. I rejected it and went for and offer £25k below that level who were. Unless you are at least under offer it's meaningless.

Why are you not on the market?

why cant you list yours til after christmas?

It could make you look desperate to buy the property which is not a strong bargaining position to put yourself in.

I wouldn't consider actually viewing a property until yours is under offer. It stops you setting your heart on somewhere you may never be able to buy.

You wouldn't even be able to view here let alone offer

@BernadetteRostankowskiWolowitz

why cant you list yours til after christmas?

That's what I was thinking. You've got nearly a week. Crack on!

When your house does go up for sale are you going to let people view it who aren't yet on the market ? Probably not, it's just not the way these things work.

Take your decorations down for the photos, call your chosen estate agent snd explain you want to move things along faster than initially thought?

What's the deal with the online agencies? Can you list it with one of those and then take it off and go with your chosen agent in the new year?

I wouldn't even let you view my property if yours wasn't a) on the market and b) under offer.

I would go for it anyway. You've got nothing to lose.

We offered on a house and it was accepted. The sellers said we had to go with their agent and we had 1 week to sell. In fairness to the agent they did a brilliant job, we put everything in the loft on Monday, they took photos on Tuesday and on Saturday we had an open house with 8 viewings and 2 offers. So if their agent is prepared to put the effort in and has people on their books who might want your house it could work.

I'd ring the estate agents and get it on the market. Get the tree down for the day and get going. If you did that you stand a chance, otherwise I really wouldn't go and view it. You're just going to always wonder if you could have had it, and compare to it if you don't get it.
If you're not proceedable then they won't take an offer, they'll just use in the numbers for how many others are interested when pushing offers from those that are good to go.

We accepted an offer from someone who lives down the road before we even hit Rightmove. We agreed to give her 2 weeks to list and sell her house before we listed. She faffed around and so we put it on the market. We then did get an asking price offer from someone who still needed to sell- we didn't take it off the market- they reduced their house and had sold within the week and we are now going through the process. Our house is our buyers 'dream house' and they told us as much when we were viewing, but ultimately we couldn't take it off the market for them as we want to get moving quickly. However we did allow them to view before the were sold because they they spoke to our estate agent and explained how keen they were - so you have nothing to lose there- we wouldn't have otherwise let them view and we would have sold to someone else (we had a slightly lower offer at the same time)