Best and finals.....how much?

[Shotinthedark2022]

A couple of weeks ago i viewed a property and fell in love with it.I put in an offer.However because the property is very popular and has a lot of interest,the vendors decided it should go to best and final offers this friday.The guide price is £225,000,my original offer was £233,000.There had also been another offer over guide price.They are still doing viewings on it.
My question is how much should i offer on it to be in with a chance.Also i have sold sstc to a buyer who just has a first time buyer below them.Do you think i stand a chance if they have offers from cash buyers?Sorry for all the questions,but this is the first time i have had to go to best and finals.Is there anyone who has experience either buying a property this way,or selling one,and if so how did you choose your buyer,was it the one that offered most or for different reasons..oh and would it help to say why i want it?
Thank you for any advice.

I’m in Scotland, so my advice is offered from background of offers over and sealed bids.

You need to decide how much this property is worth to YOU. What can you afford and what are you willing to pay?

Make your offer not a round number. So, offer maybe £235,175.

Sending a letter along with your offer isn’t a thing in Scotland as far as I’m aware, but I have seen some MNers saying it did make a difference to them as buyer or seller, so might be worth a go.

Good luck!

Thank you seeingadistance.I guess it is a bit like an auction,in that you could get carried away with an amount to offer.

Just replying in empathy as we are in the same situation! This is our 4th try at best and finals, the last occasion we would have succeeded but our chain fell apart the same day! So fed up with it all, we are in a chain of 3 properties with ours being the top of the chain. The property that we’ve offered on is going to best and finals tomorrow and our competition are chain free and in rented so it feel like we’ve already lost. However, we are going to give it a go as we have nothing to lose by trying. For each offer, we’ve made, we chose a figure that was affordable and represented the properties value to us whilst baring in mind renovations/improvements that we would like to do.
Wishing you luck with your offer.

Hi, we've just done best and finals and waiting to hear.

Property on for 325k we offered 327.5k

At the end of the day pay what you think it's worth. If you go over too much it's very likely your mortgage lender will undervalue it and not lend you the amount you might need.

It's easy to get caught up.

Oh and yes, I did put a bit of a paragraph together along with the amount.

Having spoken to the EA on the viewing about the sellers I found out a lot of information on who they wanted to sell to, their position etc and included that, I say to our advantage but I don't know if we've had our offer accepted yet.

What’s the market like where you are? We offered £80k over on a property to get it, as very clear there were several of us interested and we could afford it. What’s the max you can afford and how much do you want it??

We finally won a 'best and final' recently after looking for 6 months! (third time we had made an offer this year).
The best advice we had (actually read it on here) was to send everything in with the offer that sets out how serious a buyer you are. I did write a little paragraph to go with the offer (as I knew they were very keen to sell it to a family with young kids so worth mentioning that) but more importantly set out in the email how proceed-able we were, the great position of our buyers (how they had all their surveys done on our property already etc and we're committed to the house/chain), and then I sent a copy of our bank statement showing our deposit, the MIP if you have it, our IDs so they didn't have to chase for anything to verify the offer. Basically so the estate agent has everything to hand when giving the vendors the offer details (as we were competing with at least 4 other offers and I knew they'd all be close). Just wanted to give ourselves the absolute best shot possible!
We offered £31k over for ours because the market is still crazy around here (NW London) and to us the house was absolutely worth it!
Good luck!

It’s so tricky. I think all you can do is offer the most you are prepared to pay and hope for the best. Also bear in mind that you may need to renegotiate post survey.

We lost out on 4 houses which all went for (I would imagine) 20k over asking. I know as we offered 15-18k each time and we we lost each time to a higher bidder.

We finally had an offer accepted at 25k over but pulled out when the survey found subsidence. This house is still for sale 6 months later. We definitely got carried away and bid too high on that one!

We put ours to best and final bids years ago and the top offer (withdrawn sadly) was for £100k over the next best price which was still very good.
All in all it went for £150k more than another agent valued it at, which is why I chose the company I did.

It's impossible to know which bid will secure it.

Offer what you can afford, what you would be comfortable paying, set out your circumstances.

And don't forget it's not legally binding. It's not an auction.

Op go with what you can afford and think it’s worth. If you don’t get it, then you couldn’t afford it and it wasn’t worth it to you.

Thank you all for your good advice.One of the questions the estate agents asked in their email was.Would the offer be subject to a survey.which i thought was rather strange.Also did i need a mortgage(i don't) it would be from the proceeds from my property.Also,if i wasn't a cash buyer,how far had the conveyensing got in the chain and how many etc.Is this a standard letter for best and finals? I did speak to the estate agents,and they said a cash buyer with money in the bank would be more likely to be sucessful.I was thinking of offering around £237,500.I don't think it is worth much more.That's £12,500 over.

Yes I think all those questions are relevant and if I was the sellers this is the info I'd want to know.

We loved one for 695k. Offer 746k in best and finals. Didn’t win, we were second 😩 Did write a letter, so did the winning buyer. People are putting in high bids and then dropping following survey, even if survey not that bad, which is why that question is being asked. This is what our buyers did to us. We agreed to drop a little, but still no onward property for us unfortunately (we had one but it fell through, which is why their survey has been done).

After reading your messages again,all of which have been really helpful.I think my final offer is going to be £237,175.That's £12,175 above guide price.If i don't get it,then it was obviously not meant to be.One more question if i may.Do the estate agents let you know what the winning bid is after if your not successful?I hope all of you that have gone to best and finals get your properties.

We didn't get ours :( really gutted actually. We need to realise a few k above asking isn't going to cut it at the moment.

Our agent didn't tell us what the winning bid was but I did email him and ask why our bid wasn't accepted, was it the amount or anything else so just be cheeky and ask if you don't - no skin of their nose.

Good luck!

Amechelle 84,So sorry to hear your offer wasn't the winning one.It's awful when you have put all your hopes and effort into something only to be unsuccessful.You tried your best.I guess it just wasn't to be,and i hope you find something even better that you love.

We recently sold our property,a flat, for £40k over the asking price.

Thank you!