Negotiation Q: How to deal with our buyers playing us?

[sellotape12]

We’ve been under offer a few months and have finally found our next house we’d like to offer on. As soon as our buyers knew this, they’ve tried to undercut their offer to us by a long way. The price they want would make it now impossible for us to move. I know that lots do this and some may argue it’s savvy of them but it’s such a dramatic drop we are left unable to offer elsewhere.

We are all well aware of falling house prices which is why I’d be happy to meet in the middle, but for info, they’re tying to negotiate a further 12% off agreed price (we already knocked 8% off for them) it’s a popular suburb of London

And here’s what’s annoyed me: they are FTB using BOMAD and have a 50% deposit. They claim they want to achieve a monthly repayment that’s equivalent of last year’s interest rates. Wouldn’t we all! So I did the maths on that, and found that a negotiated price somewhere in the middle would pretty much achieve that. But the price they’re now asking for is so ridiculously a mick-take. Even the agent knocked them back.

So do we call their bluff and try find a new buyer? Or are they trying their luck and it’s up to our agent to get them up?

Luckily they can only try it on until exchange of contracts. I would be putting a very strict time limit on this to stop any further games. Exchange within two weeks or relist.

Glad to see your update and well played! Clearly your old buyers misjudged the market in your area and are not as clever as they thought! Always best not to engage with game players like this.

Good luck with the move

So, so happy to read your update! What absolute wankers!

Great update. I hope the new buyers don't mess you about and it all goes smoothly now.

Some of the aggressive posts on this thread are... odd. I'm not sure I could get so worked up on behalf of buyers I had never met.

Great update!

Big lesson for them, idiots.

Congratulations @sellotape12
I didn't see the thread before but have had a look now and they sound like total chancers despite having been gifted a huge deposit.
I hope that your sale now goes through without further hitches.

I think it feels personal to them because they are planning to buy their first home and think it's unfair that anyone stands to sell for more than what they paid. The comment "you created the price bubble" as if any one person is in control of how this all works. They seem to be confusing macro and micro economics.

It's just your garden-variety identity politics - in this case, anyone who already owns a home is the enemy and anyone trying to buy one is on their team. Younger people against not as young people, too. They are operating under the mistaken belief that that everyone who came before them had it easy and anyone looking today has the deck stacked against them, even if their parents are giving them most of the money.

And I am resisting the urge to tag them but do hope they see how this all worked out.

I was going to say, drop the offer you've made on the house you're buying so that you're not the one taking the hit and see if it works but you've sorted this.

Nice one OP.

Lovely update op.

I bet the angry poster on here is fuming.

Always a few on MN.

@AliceOlive completely agree - don’t want to start off down that path so all I’ll say is some of the comments made me laugh.

@sellotape12 - aaah amazing update OP!!! It's always satisfying to see chancers come unstuck.

For the furious FTB who was determined you were in the wrong not to slash your price....I wonder if they would be as enthusiastic if the market swung the other way and months after agreeing a sale, a seller suddenly insisted on £££ more?? I can imagine they'd be very annoyed that after agreeing a price, they were now being asked to pay much more....it's always the same with people like this. Very quick to insist sellers HAVE to drop their prices when the market falls, but conversely, outraged if they are asked to pay more because of an upward change in market conditions.

Imo, it's a shitty thing to do to change the asking price or offer when you're nearing exchange/completion. The only time it's acceptable is generally when something significant is found on a survey. But as a general principle, once a buyer and seller agree a price, there should be no further adjustments because of the market - that goes for both sides. It just smacks of someone trying to sneak a financial advantage by blaming economic conditions.

@eurochick and @AliceOlive I know right! I chuckled. Perhaps one of the angry/ tipsy keyboard warriors was my original FTB.
Also not sure that everyone understands that in England and Wales, a vendor has no obligation to sell until contracts are exchanged, which is after all the legal conveyancing. I was never 'stuck' or going to lose because... I still own my current house. We made the decision that we're happy either way. We figured if we lose our onward, so be it. I had no legal requirement to proceed selling to the FTB just because we said so. They pulled a fast one, so we withdrew and well - it backfired for them.

(Also loved the suggestion that we; an unremarkable working family, have single-handedly caused the housing marketing bubble and not decades of poor macroeconomic decisions by successive governments multiplied by too-little house building.)

Anyway, to anyone who followed this, hopefully I can offer some tips:

1- You already know what to do. Deep in your heart, you already have the answer. Use your gut.
2- Emotionally detach yourself as much as possible from your onward move and the buyers. It's a business transaction. Hold your cards.
3- Give gazundering buyers a strict, short time limit (thank you to the user who suggested this) as it gives you control back.
4- There is no mathematical formula for what a house is worth. Value is a concept that only exists in our heads really. That's why when you're buying somewhere you have to really think what your maximum comfortable price would be. And if you're selling somewhere, what's the price you're simply not willing to sell for? There will be a pool of buyers who can only afford X or want to pay X, and round the corner, there might be a pool of buyer who were thinking Y. Similarly, the news headlines and Twitter property 'gurus' who are telling the nation that we're facing a crash and to offer 15% less, fine if it works. But if the vendor rejects a 15% reduction then there's nothing you can do about it. Not all neighbourhoods are seeing the 15% reductions that the news is claiming, as some places are still micro markets and desirable and remember there's a shortage of housing everywhere which affects supply and demand.

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Wow @sellotape12 what did you do that you post came out with such a huge font?

Or am I the only one to see that. 🫣🫣

I see it. I'm intrigued too!

I thought @sellotape12 just really, really wanted to get their points across 😂

Like this! 🤣

OMG! I have no idea how I did that?! Certainly wasn't intentional. @LifeInTheUK and @NoWordForFluffy cringing now.

Even if you did know, I wouldn't reveal how to, @sellotape12, in case our resident angries start to adopt it. 🙈🤣

I can't see huge font?! Great news OP, thanks for the update

That other FTB poster has been very aggressively commenting on a number of property threads, they seem to think that people buying now are the only people in history who have ever worked for their deposit, wanted to get value for their money and have taken buying a house seriously, and more than that they seem to think that sellers owe it to buyers to let them get their own way, because of course they are just doing you a favour! It's all very bizarre

Maybe seeing the font depends how you access MN? I'm on the mobile browser.

Here it is!

< I posted this on a desktop computer not mobile and I could only see the giant font after posting.

Sorry to hear that @randomrandom . Clearly there's some frustration and envy around housebuying, which I sympathise with. It divides people. FWIW I'm the daughter of parents who ran a small shop and DH is the son of two NHS nurses. We don't come from money we just worked really hard and made good choices early on. I do wish everyone in this country had the ability to have a safe, warm home of their own. It's not fair that it isn't that way. So maybe our resident angry poster is cross at the world.

You've already reduced your price- don't drop it any further. You are falling into their trap.

That is a great update. It's one thing to negotiate at the start or when the survey has been done but to keep pretending you are going ahead as planned and then drop the offer at the last minute is gazundering. That's as shitty as gazumping. Both nasty little blackmailing tricks that put manipulative pressure on the others in the process. Those who indulge in either deserve to lose out on the house or the sale. Might teach these chancers a much needed lesson in being a decent human being and not playing silly little mind games.

Delighted for you OP. Happy new home.

Two threads in as many weeks where the OP has come good when their buyers have played dirty and two threads where our resident Debbie Downers (or I suspect Duncan Downers) have been proved wrong, I don't need to tag them, they know who they are!

I'm all for understanding market change, but I hate buyers/sellers who play dirty and a tiny minority of posters on here who aren't even home owners but think they know the entire market throughout the UK.