Decision in principle - confused by the advisor!

[Nosnogginginthekitchen]

Am I right in thinking we need a DIP in place in order to make an offer on a house and be taken seriously? Mortgage advisor is saying make an offer first and then she'll sort the DIP. Is this right? If not can anyone link to some clear info on this? I'm getting ever more confused...

Thanks

We were asked for a DIP when submitting any offers - in fact I think we may have been asked if we had one before even viewing all the properties.
They are easy enough to get online

We needed an AIP before we could even view properties. I guess it depends what the market is like where you are

I've bought five houses (most recently 18 months ago) and have never had a decision in principle. We just put an offer in then sort the mortgage out. I used to work for a bank and we didn't do decisions in principle because they're not really worth the paper they're written on.

When I was an EA we would encourage potential purchasers to get an AIP because most Vendors won’t take your offer seriously without one. Just tell her you need one.

It is true that they’re not in anyway binding, but Vendors like them.

If she won’t carry one out you can get a DIP yourself in minutes through lenders’ online decision calculators.

But I’ve never understood quite why some estate agents think they represent that you’re a serious buyer - all the DIP essentially says is “as long as you’ve told us the truth when answering these questions and subject to see us seeing all your documentation, talking to you extensively, and credit checking you, we may be prepared to lend you up to £X”

Tbh they’d never know if you had one or not. Maybe MA doesn’t want to waste time as so many people but managing to find a house to buy atm.

They literally take a couple of hours to get, we made the offer in a house, it was accepted, EA asked for a copy and we sent it the next day. Your mortgage advisor is right, often EAs use it to get you to see their own mortgage advisor!

That being said it's always a good idea to get a DIP just in case something comes up that reduces the amount you can borrow

I would not have accepted an offer and taken the house off the market unless my buyer had one (or they had cash in the bank obviously).

Literally anyone can do a DIP online though …

My experience of buying recently is that some agents wouldn't book in viewings without you confirming that you had an agreement in principle (though v few asked to see it). Others didn't care. When it came to making offers, though, they wanted to know. And for the place that we eventually bought, one of the agent's conditions for taking the listing down when our offer was accepted was that we needed to send them a copy of our agreement in principle.

TBH getting a decision in principle was helpful, in that it gave us a more precise idea of what we could borrow. That was helpful in deciding what price ranges of homes to look at, and in knowing how much room we had for negotiation on price. It doesn't take long to get one, and if it helps convince a seller or their agent that you're serious then I'd say it's worthwhile.