Offering on a property when my house is not yet SSTC

[Itsrainingten]

Is there any point at all? A house we LOVE has just had an offer. We have wanted it for a month. I understand that they're unlikely to accept (I wouldn't if I were them!) but is there any point us putting an offer on at all if our house isn't yet under offer? We're happy to offer asking price, if they can hold on. (We've had a fair bit of interest in ours in the form of viewings but haven't sold yet) Are we just wasting everyone's time? Is there a teensy chance they may say yes?

No chance, especially when they already have an offer

Of course you should, maybe the other folk who have put in an offer haven’t sold their property yet?

@Sasqwatch I hadn't thought of that. Yes maybe that could be the case. Still don't think I they'll accept our offer but I guess we've got nothing to lose by trying.
I know sometimes people don't want to offer low in case they offend a seller but I can't really see a downside to offering when we're not sold, other than wasting time. I could obviously be missing something I guess.

There's no harm in it, but wouldn't get your hopes up.
That said we offered on a property in early February having not even got ours on the market. We should be exchanging next week fingers crossed!

It's pointless and annoying for the agent tbh

You can't offer to buy something when you aren't in a position to buy it

That's like going into a shop and saying I want to buy this bag of dog food, but I can't pay for it and have no way of paying for it

Thanks @TerrierOrTerror I def won't be getting hopes up. I fully expect them to say no. I know I would. I just think I'd always be thinking "what if" if we didn't try, and just let it go to the other buyer. I think their EA was a bit annoyed that I tried if I'm honest, but who cares. It's not like I want to be his mate!

Sounds like you’ve already spoken to the agent but I would have said something like ‘we love the house and would offer asking price but we’re not proceedable. Can I leave that with you on the table and if anything happens to the current sale please let me know as we may be in a position to go ahead at that point’. A fair few sales fall through so by doing that at least you’ve made it clear you’re very interested.

Ask the EA for their thoughts. We’re in the process of moving and the EA on the house we preferred explained our vendor was happy to accept offers from buyers who hadn’t sold yet. We put our initial offer in when we didn’t have a buyer. A few days later we were STC and are now surrounded by packing boxes.

We accepted an offer before our buyers house was even on the market - but I had a baby and was fed up of cleaning & tidying the whole house for viewings every day. We just gave them a deadline to sell by.

Yes I spoke to their EA. He said he'll put it forward but implied he'd advise against them accepting. I really don't think they will, but I guess it might turn out that the other buyers also can't proceed or something I suppose and then maybe we'll be in luck.

Ha! I mean I might do that with a corner shop or something if I'd left my purse at home by mistake! "Can I just leave these here and come back for them?" A bit like that 😂
I guess worst (and most likely) case they say no. I am fully expecting that. I've done it now anyway so I guess no point worrying about it.

There's no harm, but massively unlikely to be accepted unless the other party are in the same position. But if you make an offer, at least they might come back to you if the other one falls through in future.

We aren't viewing houses until we have an offer on ours, to avoid this stress.

Definitely put forward an expression of interest

But no point offering until you're proceedable

You've got nothing to loose - who knows they might not feel there's a property out there they want to go to right now. We had friends who made an offer in this situation and it was accepted as long as they were sold STC within two weeks.

If it's a 'no', ask agent to let owners know you're seriously interested and will be going back to them when in a better position, that way you're at the back of their minds if other offers come along.

A seller will usually only take a chance on you and wait for you to sell your house if you're offering substantially over asking. Which is hard to do when you don't know how much you're getting for your own.

Put in an offer above market price and ask for a months exclusivity (ie no more viewings) while you get yours in the market? Worked for us and we were proceedable within a week. It felt bonkers at the time but we exchanged last week.

It may be worth expressing an interest just in case something happens with the person who has already offered

We are on the market, just not sold sadly. We have had quite a bit of interest but no offers yet. 2 sets of people said they were going to and then didn't.
Is that a thing some buyers would go for then? Over asking price but hold off showing it to others for set time? I've never heard of that. We could afford to go up to about 2% over what they're asking for. Even if we reduced ours by about 5% for a sale

It does sound like you won’t be lucky this time I’m afraid. However would it help at all to have your house with the same agent if you can? Give them a double incentive to get it sold rather than feeling like a time waster?