About to put our house up for sale...anyone else? Part Two!

[InTheCludgie]

Hi everyone here is the new thread for those of us who are about to, or are currently trying to, sell our homes!

So we are now back on the market and have a viewing tomorrow morning, plus one for early next week. This week is a bit tricky as it's DS's birthday so have had to say no to a couple of suggested times for viewings.

How is everyone else getting on?

I would be tempted to go at £330k if you're a cash buyer.

@Volterra I would offer 340, 330 if you're feeling lucky. As as cash buyer you're in a strong position, and if it's been on since mid-Oct the sellers probably recognise they are unlikely to get the asking price.

I would also try that. But don't rely on sensible buyers. We made an asking price offer on a house that had been on the market since August with only one, apparently 'low', offer made on it. The agent bit our hands off but it took the sellers 48 hours to decide to accept it as it had been marketed at 'offers over'. I could only imagine the agent's frustration.

Good point, @Doubleraspberry If I should have learned anything from this process, it's not to expect anyone to be sensible!

Thank you both. I have a feeling they may want 350k, I don’t have it ! The seller is related to someone who works at the agency as it says on details.

Meanwhile my cousin’s house has been on for about 2 weeks at 350k and she has just had an offer of 270k..

Moving home with Charlie had a good way to respond when agents and sellers want you to up the price. You don't ask you don't get. Good luck!

are they accepting that?

@nix31 , I didn’t actually ask if she is accepting as a I got the impression from the exclamation marks she wasn’t. I don’t think she will get 350k as does need a lot of work but I do think she will get about 320k, she has priced sensibly for the current market I feel. Thanks for the screenshot.

Predictions are a 20% fall so is not that ridiculous, especially if they are cash buyer etc.

@Volterra Yeah, would not rely on sensible sellers. We offered 10% below. We don't need a mortgage (but do rely on sale of our house so not true cash buyers). They just had their buyers pull out and were desperate for someone proceedable, which we are. Our offer seemed to almost offend them. They managed to get us to up our offer by £10k. Admittedly, there's nothing like it on the market and they probably know that. And we will hopefully never ever have to move again until we are old and downsizing.

Hear what you are saying but she had priced it deliberately low to the extent I hadn’t expected it to be be what it went on for.

@thunderouslug I am worried about offending sellers. I wasn’t until I read threads on here where people were saying they would refuse to negotiate further. Friend has just said offer 330k. We have cash and we can stay here as long as we need to so wouldn’t put anyone under pressure within reason. We may not like it so potentially all academic but hopefully at some point one we do want will turn up.

We have ours on for £300k but we're happy to accept £275k if we have an offer accepted on our next house and just need to complete the chain. I don't think we'd accept it immediately without an onward purchase but we'd be happy to keep it on the table. The £300k valuation was more than we expected but was the same from all the estate agents who did a valuation. We did all our figures based on £275k before deciding to go on the market. Obviously we would take more if we could get more but that's our bottom line if we're ready to move.

I wouldn't be offended with very low offers but I wouldn't enter into negotiations with anyone who offers less than we're willing to take. Gazundering has become such common practice that I don't trust anyone who opens with a very low offer.

Just looking at the news about house prices dropping 2.3% in November. That’s £8280 on £360,000 by my calculations.

@superdupernova if someone offered 270k would that be too low for you to negotiate? I don’t mean this confrontationally, just trying to gauge a variety of different thoughts. 30k on 300k feels more than 30k on 360k in my head. I don’t think I want to start at 340k reading the news. Probably academic as we will probably not like it In reality which is a theme at the moment with our house hunting - could have done with getting in earlier as have too much time to overthink and plague you all on here 😀

I'd negotiate from 270k but that's probably the limit. I've seen too many stories on here about people trying to go down to their original offer and arguing that the market has changed. I could risk a last minute attempt and negotiate them back up to 275k from there. Realistically we don't neeeed to move either so could call someone's bluff if they're unreasonable. I'd rather lose a couple of thousand in fees than feel like someone blackmailed me into losing much more with gazundering... Though of course we might be in love with the next house and then need to take the hit anyway.

I think with lower priced houses there's a much bigger difference in what you get within a 30k range. The cheapest 3 bed houses around here are about 260k but they're in the not so nice areas of town and either a bit smaller or the same size but look like they haven't been decorated in 30 years.

Thank you @superdupernova , that is really helpful 😊

We've got the first (and hopefully last) batch of enquiries from our buyer's solicitor. They asked for a bunch of stuff I had already uploaded to my solicitor's system weeks ago. So not sure who is to blame here. The words indemnity insurance have also already been uttered. At least it's a sign things are moving ahead. Survey for our purchase is also booked for next week. Which made me realise our buyer didn't have a survey. Do you reckon she'll still get one? Haven't heard anything from the EA and I feel like if not now, then probably never?

@thunderouslug Presumably your buyer has had her mortgage offer confirmed (if she needs one)? We booked our survey straight after we got that through, though it took ages.

I'm feeling the stress of it all more than usual today. We still haven't heard back from our gazundering buyers regarding our attempt to address their concerns/meet them somewhere in the middle. Last I heard, this was because the EA hadn't actually managed to speak to them yet. But the radio silence plus the news about house prices is difficult.

We had the survey report through on our purchase today. The surveyor says "no major red flags" but there are several things that need addressing (Victorian house), some of which we will be asking for the seller to pay for but others that we understand we will need to deal with ourselves and really just won't be able to afford do do if our buyers don't accept our offer. The thought of further weeks of negotiation and uncertainty is awful, but the thought of the chain collapsing and starting from scratch at some point is awful too. I know this is very negative, just needed to get it out I think.

Our house went on the market yesterday for £395-425 'guide price'. It's a very popular road with good schools etc., and we've got 6 viewings booked in for the weekend, which is reasonable for the time of year I think? We've put an offer of £440 on a £450-475k house in a less popular area as we don't need schools now as empty nesters. They are still accepting viewings and have an offer on a house in a very popular area. The agents are the same for all 3 properties... Will see what happens, but as you say the market is uncertain.

Just gone up to 8 viewings!

Hi @Allfurcoatandnoknickers that all sounds very promising. I think houses in some areas will always be in demand, sounds like yours is one of those! Out of interest is your guide price less than it would have been earlier in the year? My sale is currently going through and I had multiple viewings and offers a couple of months ago. Conveyancing is really slow though and if the worst comes to the worst and we had to re market now I think I’d need to lower the price to get as much interest.

We’ve had it valued in September with two agents and one said £425-450 but I thought that was optimistic so we went with the lower valuation.

We've done it!
House sale completed, cash in bank account.

Good luck to you all in the thick of it. I hope it ll works out for you all.

Going to attempt the stamp duty refund portal at the weekend. I'll let you know how we get on.

Awww congratulations @LionessesRules ! Happy to bask in your relief while pretending I don't have a year of stress ahead of me.

Congratulations @LionessesRules !
Apparently you get your SD back in 15 days so a Xmas present indeed 🤶