Quick advice on offer needed please!

[Worriedmum40284]

Hi all, we've had 2 viewings of a house (house 1) we like but takes us further away from schools etc so have been doing our homework and seeing if we can make it work.

Viewed one other house this morning to help us make a decision either way. Fairly confident we do want to offer on house 1.

EA has just called to say an offer has been made. House is on at £550k, been on just under a month. What do we go in at? Would 530 be too low considering there is now another offer on the table?

I wouldnt write a personal note. Especially if they are going through a separation. Just state the facts - chain free sale, happy to move quickly etc
If unsure between 535 and 540 offer in the middle of the 2?
good luck!!

Yes anything that even had a whiff of emotional manipulation would put me right off to be honest.

I agree with others about not trying to tug on the heartstrings.

You need to find your ‘no regrets’ figure. You don’t want to go in at £530k and discover ver later that the other party ‘won’ with a bid of £531k. However, you also don’t want to go in at £555k, secure the house, but spend the next 10 years worrying that you overpaid.

The last house we bought we offered full asking price. We were moving out of London to the Home Counties and were aware someone else was interested in it. We could probably have shoogled around and got a couple of grand off if we'd been that way inclined.

We honestly felt 'it's the house we want, we couldn't possibly find anything like that in London and don't want to piss people about.' so we offered what they were asking.
They bit our hand off, which is understandable. The process was so smooth because they were essentially very grateful to us for paying full whack.

For us the house was the one we wanted and we couldn't be arsed going through the 'nearly but not quite' parsimonious process time and time again.

If you want the house and you'll be pissed off to lose it, pay as much as you are happy to/ can afford.

Thought I'd give an update - we didn't get the house unfortunately. After the initial disappointment, we're ok about it which I think shows we probably had a few little doubts about the compromises we were making and that this is for the best.

Also, just as well as turns out our cash buyers aren't actually cash buyers as they have something to sell (although our EA insist this doesn't mean they're not cash buyers 🤔) But that's a whole other story!

Thanks for all your advice.

That's a shame.

Out of interest, what did h decide to offer in the end?

That’s disappointing but sounds to me that it wasn’t quite what looking for. I am interested to know what you offered too. Thanks for updating us.

We offered 540k. The EA said it was close so suspect the other bid may have been 545k.