To all the not-yet-buyers out there...

[HavenSprings]

I see that there's a thread for the buyers & sellers currently in the buying/selling process, but I'd like to create a space for those, like me, who still haven't joined the buyers ranks!

So, DH and I viewed every house we needed to viewed, offered on every house we needed to offer, and now we're back to where we started from (with a bit of extra knowledge on what we want and what we don't want, at least): waiting on new properties to come to the market, or old properties to come back.

What's your situation? Are you still desperate to buy or have you made peace with it? Do you still hope for a miracle before Christmas or are you already stopping your daily checks on RM and thinking about picking them up next year?

Speaking of RM, I have a random question: the houses that do not appear under offer or sold STC, have they been taken off the market before selling? I'm assuming so, but was curious to double-check with you.

Otta has a nice breakdown of house prices including location tops and bottoms for each home type. Demonstrates how two people saying exactly the opposite can both be right!

https://otta.property/july_2024

Thank you @XVGN , that's much helpful.

Meanwhile, new property on the market and secured a viewing on Thursday! There are a few queries to be made (chain, flood risk, parking) but we're now at that stage where we'll compromise more than originally allowed for. Just need to be sure we won't need to compromise too much! Fingers crossed.

Hope you'll all have luck with possible new properties on the market this week!

Good luck HavenSprings.

A house is worth what someone is prepared to pay. You can always find a reason for not buying. While faffing about £5k I wonder if you go have factored in the cost of renting for another year? Sometimes you pay the asking price if it ticks enough boxes. Nothing is perfect. A beautiful house with a charming garden in an idyllic location is not going to go for a song.

The house was not beautiful nor perfect. I needed that 5k for the works I needed to do in it, so yes, I offered what I was prepared to pay for it! And, honestly, someone who doesn't budge on 5k doesn't sound to me like someone who'd been easy to face this long process with. I made my choice and am happy with it.

For a house that I wasn't already compromising a lot on, I would have gladly gone up to the full asking price.

I hear this all the time and in some respects it’s obviously true. But a house we like has been on the market for over 18 months and not sold. If I go along and pay asking price is it now worth that overinflated amount? Because I can pretty much guarantee if we tried to sell for that price at some point after buying we would struggle and that would have been after spending a substantial amount of money on repairs and necessary maintenance.
We’d happily have paid 5k over what we thought it was worth really, but that wouldn’t get us close to an offer that would be accepted. And you do have to draw the line somewhere. If you’ll happily pay 5k over, why not 10? That’s only 5k more than you would have been happy paying.

It wouldn't be worth the overinflated amount now, especially if by now it's vacant!

Meanwhile, 'my' houses are still sitting there on the market. Another house on the same street as one the two has arrived on the market and gone within 1 week. It was exactly the same as the one I've seen, only difference was 4 sq metres extra of storage. Makes me wonder if I missed something obvious that's wrong in the other house? 🤔

How are things now @HavenSprings ?

Have you found anything suitable yet?

I think when you find the right one, you just know. And you'll learn what you're willing to compromise on, or not.

It's really important to see plenty of places. As much as anything, to narrow down what you do and don't want. It's funny the stuff you don't realise is important to you until you start looking.

The right place will turn up before you know it. :)

I am in the same boat. Been looking for too long now. (since 2021)

Every offer I put in then got outbid. Got frustrated and went through auction. Biggest regret of my life. Lost 30k. Went to court over it. That dragged on
Pretty much didn’t get anything back from it as my legal fees ate into it. Had to start saving again. Tried to buy in the north early 2023 but it just didn’t work out.
Moved for work summer last year. Decided to try again in my new location.
Got an offer accepted on a property, did a survey and it came back with every issue possible. I got spooked and dropped out. No regrets over it though

Summer this year I am starting to learn what location is what and try again.

Offered on one property that needed a refurb but liveable. Got my offer accepted then found out rates had gone up so had to pull out as it would have put me at the maximum I was willing to spend plus the works required. - only regret was not revising my offer but I know sellers hate that and it ended up selling right after I pulled out.

A month later I view another and offered my maximum as it was competitive. Got my offer accepted. Was excited! But then I had too many people in my ear telling me it wasn’t the one and was overpriced plus a rough area.
I immediately dropped out - absolutely absolutely regret that decision and wish I went through with it .

Properties in that area are now selling for 20- 30k over what they sold for at summer. I recently offered on a property further down from that location at my maximum budget and got outbid.
I can’t believe how in the space of 5 months prices have gone up that much. This is where I would agree that EA pluck figures out of thin air or sellers are deluded because it really doesn’t make sense how 2 beds are selling at pretty much the same price as 3 beds but I guess demand.

Waiting to see if the 3 new properties that have come on the market this week will sell or come down eventually cause the prices are absurd to me for what it is.

As it stands I can no longer afford a 2 bed in all the 3 different semi decent locations I was hoping to buy in.
Feeling very defeated and kinda loosing hope. But also blame myself for still being on the market.

At least now I am very confident in what I am looking for and what I can afford and will most certainly not be discussing any house I view with anyone especially my family.

I actually did! I realise now I should join the other thread! Was starting to believe this day would never come! 😆

@Dandelion24 I am so sorry it's taking you this long. As you say, you have learnt from experience and you definitely won't make the same 'mistakes' twice. Some of them might not be mistakes, who knows? Maybe the rough area wouldn't have worked for you, and now you'd be regretting the other decision of going ahead.

Hopefully, now that you know exactly what to look for, things will finally move along! Fingers crossed.

We're FTBs and just dipping our toes in and starting to look seriously. First viewings lined up for this weekend!

I'm finding it hard to work out the strength of our buying position. It does feel that as FTBs who are ready to go, plus this slow market, we should feel quite flexible. But I don't know if it would be better to not commit to anything until next year or even spring...? We're flexibly renting so we don't have huge pressure to move aside from our personal desire to settle down!

I think once you start looking you will eventually find a property that stands out as the one for you, that could be soon or it could take a few months. Once you find a property you love you will want to commit.

You are in a good position being a FTB as could proceed straight away if you found the ideal property.

What's your fear about committing now? If you find 'the house', go for it! It can still take a long time while you wait for a chain/survey/searches. And it can take a long time finding the right house regardless, so it's good if you start viewing a few now. You'll soon realise what it is that you are looking for. Good luck!

I guess we've just been renting and saving for so long (we're in our early 30s) that it feels strange to finally be in a position to commit to something! And think in timescales of multiple years instead of 12mo at a time...

We've got a couple viewings later today, although that was just to get the ball rolling - at least on paper neither are my dream house even for "right now" tbh. If I understand the housing market right, it seems it picks up again in the new year quite a bit? We'll keep an open mind but I'm not anticipating we'll find anything at this time of year. But I could be wrong!

The housing market is pretty stagnant at the moment @OneAmberFinch so I doubt there will be a massive rush of new properties to the market in the Spring, though there will be some of course.

Stamp duty is increasing from April so that won't help the market especially for FTBs unless the government announce something to help FTBs before then. Seems unlikely but you never know.

Interesting. Just had a call from the agent about the properties we looked at on the weekend. We ended up seeing 4 in total on Saturday, all in the same area: 2 absolutely not suitable, 1 amazing but near top of our budget, 1 quite a bit cheaper but very nice for the price.

Agent saying he thinks the market is booming and houses are flying off the shelves. Hmm... doesn't really tally with what I read so I'm assuming this is agent speak but maybe he knows something I don't.

We're looking around the £700k mark so while we're slightly affected by the stamp duty changes it's not as big a difference as it would be at lower brackets.

Definitely do not trust ANYTHING an agent says 😂

We're in the process of selling late DM's house. It's been on the market six weeks, and the agents have escorted 15 or 20 viewers around her two up two down well-maintained Edwardian terrace in a cul-de -sac in a Midlands town. 15 minute walk to station, less than an hour to London. In good condition but aesthetically, it's old lady choices. But the deal breaker is the parking. There is no room in a single track street to have parking both sides.

In fact the parking is much less of a problem than viewers seem to think, because all the residents understand that people come and go throughout the day. It's being marketed as a first time buy, but it's a brilliant downsize option too. The shops are two minutes on foot.

How do you decide when to reduce the price?

I honestly don't have enough knowledge of the market to advise @Papyrophile, but I'm hoping @Twiglets1 might come to the rescue!

I think when (if) the viewings dry up you should reduce the price @Papyrophile

By about 5% taking the Rightmove bands into account so the new price is ideally in the lower band.

Normally I would say take the house off the market by December to relist in the Spring but with stamp duty becoming more expensive from April, it’s probably worth pushing hard to try to get it sold before then.

Thanks @Twiglets1 . That would have been my instinct too, but I think we'll see more people deciding to buy in the hope of beating the April SDLT change. Bracing for the rush!!