Vendors Divorcing - want to put in a cheeky offer

[Isitover23]

Hi

we viewed a property a few weeks ago that is over our budget.

It was originally on for £950,000 in May and has since been reduced twice by £25k a time, and is now advertised for £900,000.

we know they are divorcing but the EA said they aren’t in a rush to move! It’s a lovely house but does need a bit of work. We are in the South.

if we were to offer, we would want to put in a cheeky offer and I was thinking 15% below the asking price (£765,000). We aren’t in ‘love’ with it so wouldn’t be too sad if the offer isn’t countered! But this seems like a lot of money and is nearly £100k less than what they paid for the house last year when they bought it.

has anyone has any experience with a vendor divorcing, as I would think they would just want to see to enable them both to move on?

thanks

I'm presuming they'll reject the offer though. Especially if it's less than they paid.

thats just rude not cheeky!

Why???

It's a financial decision, not personal.

@LlynTegid @ladyvivienne what, exactly do you find problematic about a lower offer? This is how it goes.
Agent : We have an offer for XYZ.
Vendor : Nope.

The end. It takes all of 2 seconds, there is nothing to get riled up over.

I don't know how much buying and selling experience you both have as well but a higher offer doesn't mean it will go through for that! Buyers can use a survey to knock the price down even further, demand a last minute reduction knowing they have the vendors over a barrel, etc. When I bought last year it took 6 months and by that time if a buyer pulls out price might have dropped even further.

People pulling last minute tricks should be blacklisted. Not people who make an honest offer, stick to it and pay the price. If you don't like it just reject (or empower your agent to automatically reject offers below X). But people do ZERO harm in asking. Absolutely ZERO. Your hurty feelz don't count.

@EldenRing4 of course you can go in as low as you like but if you go in too low, be prepared to accept that the vendors may not wish to negotiate with you.

I have a friend who is divorcing. Since they are fighting over money and will need to be running two households, they are not going to be selling the house for cheap. Plus they are not in a desperate hurry to sell - one of them is taking housesitting summer jobs so they can live apart. You can by all means put the offer in, but don't expect them to drop on the grounds of divorce.

I quote the OP:
"We aren’t in ‘love’ with it so wouldn’t be too sad if the offer isn’t countered!".

What was your point again?

We had a stupidly low offer on our house

I told the estate agent they can get to fuck and I don't want to hear from them again even if they increase their offer. I didn't trust them not to be Fucks throughout the whole process.

The estate agent was also pissed off as he knew their circumstances. Knew they could offer more and told them not waste everyone's time. So he was wary with them and as it's a small area word got around they were fuckwits.

Basically they made a name for themselves for being cheeky fucks with all the estate agents. Did not end well.

I do wonder how the OP found out?
She didn't say that the EA told them. This is what people assumed, but they could have found out from, say a neighbour.
The EA has said that they're not in a rush to move so telling OP about the divorce seems a bit counterproductive if that was the impression they wished to give.

It was the EA. I called after the viewing as we saw that they only bought the house in 2022 and he told me.

Well we also put a couple of 'stupidly low offers' in.... vendors reacted similarly... guess what happened?
After a couple of price drops houses never sold. Got taken off the market. Serves them right.
One was a LL and the house had Japanese knotweed. It came from the railway next to it (so recurring problem). They wanted the same price as a house which just needed a bit of work doing... daft as a brush.
The other - one way in, one way out. Way in was fine... way out... right turn across a 4 way junction with NO traffic lights for the right turn. Constant stream of traffic. After waiting 20 mins i finally gauged it safe to turn only to almost be hit by a car turning out of a side road I didn't even realise existed and that I couldn't see.

Both in areas that we couldn't otherwise have afforded. But some things can't be overcome with even the most 'luxurious' area.

Other than that during that time early 2022 was vestiges of the post-Covid boom... houses were going over asking. Like now, nobody had any sense of what the correct price was!

The house we eventually bought was in the nice part of a more downmarket area. We went to best and finals and won! The house was initially priced just right. Excellent condition, more space than the photos ( despite being a 4 bed one of the bedrooms are so large it can easily be split into 2), close to amenities and public transport.

If a house is worth it people will offer. OP has already said that her offer is based on research, not stumbling around hoping for a bargain.

Also... if you get many offers why would you be riled up about one low one. If you do it suggests you pinned your hopes on them...which means your house is overpriced anyway as nobody else wants to offer.

Their 'need' to run two households doesn't over ride the market. Did a young family's need for a home over ride the market on the way up at any stage?
They won't sell it cheap, they will sell it at market value or remove it from the market.

@EldenRing4
Can't be bothered to read all of your bit. Hope it all worked out for you

In relation to me. No we had other offers. And we accepted. Happy days.

It was just unnecessarily cheeky. The estate agent told them we wouldn't even consider it. I'd rather just don't offer. It shows you're not serious.

And like I said it didn't end well for them. Oh well

Makes sense. I suppose they had no choice but to tell you.
It also indicates (ish?) that nothing is wrong with the house itself, as you'd think with people selling up so soon.
Anyway OP I don't think you will get it if they're prepared to wait - but as you're not in love with the house anyway don't offer over what you're prepared to pay.

How desperate are you to move?

Yeah it worked out for me. Not for my vendors who reacted like you though. Glad it worked out for you.
I still find it strange that you got so riled up when you had other offers. Just accept them. No need to be so angry with the people offering.

IME the vendors who got angry had no other choice :) ending in them needing to take their house off the market and be stuck with it. Happy days.

@EldenRing4
What's not to understand?

I get frustrated with people wasting my time. Don't want it? Don't put a stupid offer in

The estate agent told them we wouldn't accept. Why would we when we had other offers.

To persist at that point is sheer idiocy.

Each to their own.

I just wanted to add for the OP that when couples divorce, it is often the case that only one half of the couple want to move. The other half would prefer to keep the family home (especially if there are children) and will do everything they can think of to delay the sale, which includes not providing ID so the conveyancer can open the file, not signing initial forms and not returning signed documents when asked to.

The divorcing couple will need to agree on the percentage split, i.e. often a Consent Order is required to provide clarity on who gets what when the house is sold. This means waiting for the courts to settle the divorce and Consent Order and your conveyancing solicitor having to wait for the seller's conveyancing solicitor to liaise with their client's Marital Solicitor (could be two solicitors, each one representing one of the party).

The other delaying factor will be if the seller's are trying to tie in each of their purchases to their sale, i.e. to you.

Purchasing a property from a divorcing couple is not generally a smooth transaction.

On the flip side we also had our stupidly low fuckwit offer refused on this house.

5m later it was still on the market and it had reduced by nearly the same amount as our fuckwit offer. We rang up and asked the EA if they'd still be interested in selling to us - they bit our hand off.

So we went in with a further £15k less that was accepted and moved in 2m later as we weren't in a chain by that point 🙃

'I still find it strange that you got so riled up when you had other offers. Just accept them. No need to be so angry with the people offering.'

Exactly. It takes a couple of minutes to say 'no' via the EA. Far more time keeping the house cleaning, removing the children, etc before multiple viewings plus all the form filling.

You can offer what you like but I doubt they would accept it. Especially as it is less than what they paid for it.
They said they aren't in a hurry ti sell so why would they accept it?

That's what I'm talking about! :)
@rainingsnoring I do think people are very emotionally invested in their house sales. They also rarely do any research r.e price, letting the EA work it out...

Also @Megifer I also got a couple of calls like that. from houses we hadn't offered on, but the lower price was what we thought suitable for the house.
By that time we were well onto our purchase but the difference was palpable. Before June 2022 houses were flying off shelves at stupid prices. At that time rates were about 3.5%, when a year earlier our neighbours had bought for half of that.

Midway through our transaction in Autumn 2023 rates had gone to 4+ % and that's when we got the flurry of phone calls.

we are proceedable , but will perhaps look at another on the street as these seem more reasonably priced

Why haven't you done this already? I'm assuming there must be something more appealing about this property if you haven't enquired about the others?

There's a lot to unravel here, and I have to agree that you came across badly in your OP @Isitover23

But sticking to the facts, the house sold for about 865k in 2022? Their EA was an idiot for valuing it at 950k in the first place and for blabbing about their personal circumstances to potential Buyers. They should have put it on for 900k in the first instance to see how close they could get to the amount they paid (they were never realistically going to get more than they paid in this market without doing improvements to it).

To enable them to sell the house and move on, I guess they probably need to get close to what they paid. However, no one should overpay because of a Vendor's situation. You say that other houses in that road are selling for about 800k so I would offer that, if you can afford it. If you can't afford it, look at cheaper roads.

I think you’ll create a very unfavourable impression by going that low just hoping they’re desperate. It doesn’t sound like they are. They paid 865k, other houses are being sold for 800k plus. They’re not going to
lose that much just so they can ‘start again’ a bit quicker. I think you’re fine to offer low but that’s just too low.