Potential pitfalls of buying a reposessed property

[tailinthejam]

Interested in whether people have done this, and how things panned out. Is there anything to be concerned about? DC & their DP have recently viewed a leasehold flat, it is in their price bracket, but they've told me today that it was reposessed from the previous owner, and the agent has limited information about it.

I'd like DC and DP to be able to go into this with their eyes open, so to speak.

I'm also wondering whether it would be a good idea to make an offer of considerably less than the asking price. It has been for sale for some time.

Can anybody help please?

Back in the 90s when we bought here a lot of property on the market had been repossessed. In the end the one we bought wasn't but things we learned were.....

Often people left in a distressed state so view properly. We saw the obvious like carpets cut down the centre, but also look for areas they may have trashed in their frustration. Some houses I couldn't even think of living in they had such a sad vibe about them.

When offers were made they were often.low but when accepted the banks put an advert out saying offers above £xxx,xxx would be considered up to exchange of contracts, so the better deal you get , you might still lose it later if someone jumps in with a higher offer and you get left with costs. Its a bit more of a gamble although where they would advertise nowadays I don't know! Back then we all.bought local newspapers. Maybe they'd leave it on rightmove?

Piles of post! I doubt that just stops when you buy.

As the property has been repossessed, don't expect any enquiries that the solicitor raises to be answered properly. The mortgage lender who repossessed, won't know anything about the property, so most responses will be 'unknown'. They also won't have paperwork/evidence to pass on. Your DC will need to "take a view" on the lack of information about the property. Your solicitor will check if there are any outstanding debts, i.e. ground rent and service charges from when the previous owner owned the property

We purchased our current very old house as a repossession in 2018.

It hadn't been purchased as a rental by the people that were repossessed but after they failed to sell it, it was tenanted for some time so it was rather neglected (putting it mildly!) even before the repossession occurred. That said, apart from what looked like an axe had been taken to the hob and some broken windows, there were no signs of deliberate damage.

Definitely be prepared for sabotage by the previous owners, though. We got off fairly lightly in that respect, but as an aside we once bought a sink unit on ebay from a couple who were in the throes of being repo'd and they had removed (and sold!) all the skirting boards, most of the floorboards etc from the flat!

With regards to our house, there were no helpful answers to any of the property info forms questions and as @Frecklespy says, we had to take a view in respect of such.

We weren't getting a mortgage so only had ourselves to satisfy.

The stipulation was that the sale went through in 28 days which we just about managed. We paid slightly over the initial asking price and the property continued to be marketed till we'd exchanged contracts.

Thanks, that's really helpful. Fortunately, the property looks as though it has been completely removated since the previous people left, so I reckon they had left it in quite a state. I don't know whether it had been owner-occupied or a buy-to-let with a tenant.

It is all electric I think, which has been cut off. Does anyone know whether there might be any problems with the utility company reconnecting a normal meter, or do you think that they might insist on a prepayment meter for a first-time buyer, bearing in mind the history connected with the property? The previous people may have left unpaid utility bills behind them.

If the flat has been fully renovated, they must have used power, so not sure why electricity is still cut off, may just be because it’s empty long term. There shouldn’t be any issues with being asked to settle previous owners bills.
we purchased a flat where the builders had gone bankrupt, and as PP said any queries from the solicitors weren’t answered as the liquidators had no information.
As it’s a leasehold flat I would be far more interested in the service charges and ground rent and most importantly who the managing agents are and the terms of the lease .