Offers on house

[Mamasuzette]

Our house has been on the market for about 7 weeks. We have received our first offer. 5k over asking price. The buyer has sold but is in a chain of 3. Would you accept their offer or wait and see? We have 4 more viewings booked for next week. The agents seem to think that we should wait for a better offer (position wise). They advised us that a first time or cash buyer would be a much safer option.

While i know this is true, we also don’t want to turn down a good offer, not knowing how many more viewings we may have to do to get another.

advise appreciated :)

This is the first offer, out of how many viewings so far? The first offer from 2 viewings, or from 25? Of the 4 booked in next week, how many are FTBs or cash buyers? Does the agent know anything about this particular chain of 3 that might indicate it'll be slow, or is s/he just making a very generalised comment about the speed of FTBs/cash buyers? (If the latter, I think others might consider that a very disputable point.) How long would be be prepared to stay on the market to beat 5K over asking?

A bird in the hand, as they say .... I'd take the offer.

Hey OP, it's really valid to say: "thank you for the offer, we are seriously considering it. We will proceed with the upcoming viewings as scheduled and update you at the end of the week."

Then give EAs instruction to tell the viewers that an offer's been received over asking and they can decide whether to go ahead or not.

Chain of 3 isn't long, if they're sold that's a good position. FTBs can be a nightmare to sell to - panicking about every tiny thing in a survey and needing hand holding due to inexperience.

The only time I sold to a cash buyer was no fun - he was an entitled trust-fund kid who kept mansplaining that he "held all the cards" and renegotiated money off on exchange day saying "he negotiates every deal, why would this be different?"

At least normal buyers in a chain have an understanding of how you feel and might be expected to behave reasonably!

In your shoes I'd most likely go with the offer and not mess around imagining your dream buyer is someone else.

I went ahead with a chain of three over a first time buyer and it paid off. We had another first time buyer pull a fast one on us and lost the house we wanted.

We are very much of the mindset that we are happy with the offer and feel comfortable with a standard chain. It’s more the agents who are trying to steer us towards first time buyers. Obviously there is always the risk that it could fall through, but this could happen with a buyer who isn’t in a chain.

I had a nightmare ‘cash buyer’ when i sold my first property who messed me around for months, changing the goalposts constantly. I ended up telling them that the sale was off and luckily found another buyer really quickly.

The only concern I have is that the chain may put us at a disadvantage when putting offers in on properties we want to buy. Would this be the case?

Our gut feeling is to accept the offer, but we would like to minimise the risk of ending up back at square one as much as possible.

We had about 8 other viewings before the two offers.

We are in a similar position and I am feeling twitchy about our potential buyers getting annoyed and going elsewhere. The cash buyers seem not to be serious in our case as it turns out. We will probably accept the offer on Monday as we can't hang around forever while the cash buyers make their minds up! I feel a bit pushed into this situation by our agent and wish I'd trusted my gut and bitten the initial offerers' hands off tbh.

Good luck op and keep your 🤞🤞🤞 for us too!

In general I would definitely accept an offer over asking, a chain of 3 is fine. I think in this situation I might consider waiting until the other viewings have taken place as suggested. It might prompt them to increase their offer in which case you know they really want it and are likely to push the purchase through and therefore I would accept a second, higher offer and agree to take it off the market. Bit of a game though!

I would accept it. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush and it is a good offer

Find out the position if those viewing next week, if they are proceedable or not. Get the EA to thank those who made the offer and say you'll let them know after the next viewings have taken place.

That’s great that you have offers. We feel the same tbh, the more we have thought about it the more confident we feel about the buyer in a chain as they seem much more ‘straight to the point’ with everything.

The position of the buyer is one thing, but if someone is a complete nightmare, it’s not going to me smooth sailing regardless.

Good luck😊 🤞 keep your fingers crossed for us too. Please let us know how you get on xx

Friends of mine have sold to FTB and have had bad experiences with several hold ups. Why are the agents so insistent that we sell to one?

Surely chains are pretty standard, as the majority of people need to sell to buy, and aren’t first time or cash buyers. We haven’t found anywhere to buy ourselves either, so while we don’t want any added stress, we aren’t in a huge rush.

We have told the agents that we will discuss whatever offers we have at the end of next week once all the viewings have taken place, and will be making a decision.

Absolutely go with the offer.
FtBs are not a golden ticket and are.mpre likely.to pull pit of a sale than more experienced buyers.

How many of the potentially viewers likely to offer over asking price?

I'd take it off the market as a gesture of good will and accept the offer ASAP.

If your EA has booked in more viewings, they should know the status of those potential buyers. Are any of them actually FTB or cash buyers? As others have said, FTB and cash buyers aren't always the best option. We sold our last place to a FTB who freaked out over every little thing and dragged out the process for 6 months (no chain either side)! Prior to that we had one offer from a cash buyer who tried to pressure us to take his offer within 24 hours or it was off the table, and another offer from a cash buyer who strung us along for 2 months before pulling out for no apparent reason - he claimed he thought we "no longer wanted to sell the property"??? So yes, I would personally take a chain of 3 with an over asking offer.

We are more than happy with the offer/position of the buyer. It’s the agents who have pressured us into the idea of selling to a first time buyer. I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks FTB can potentially be problematic.

The other viewings are a mixture of FTBs and people who have sold STC. I’m not sure of the length of their chains. We have been updated and apparently our potential buyer is number 4 in the chain, so we would make it 5. They still think this is too long. I just feel really confused as i was under the impression we could sell to whoever we want to. I’m getting s bit irritated that they seem to be trying to control the situation. Then again, if we don’t listen to them and the chain falls through, maybe we will wish we did?! It’s all a bit of a gamble isn’t it. I suppose regardless of which buyer we go with, anything can happen until completion. I still can’t believe how long it all takes, but that’s another thread entirely lol…