Should I put a note through the door of the house I want to buy?

[Fourthmusketeer]

Is this a weird thing to do?

Our house isn't actually on the market yet, as we don't want to do that until we find another house we like. They so rarely come up - I've been looking for a year now and just nothing is quite suitable. But, there's a house I've loved for years. I just love everything about it. It's the perfect location, great size, perfect layout for us (DH is quite particular). It's a beautiful house. Once I'd looked it up on Rightmove I fell in love with it even more.

The current owners bought the house in 2021, so it's probably unlikely they'd be looking to sell. But, you never know?

Is it weird to put a note through their door to find out? Do I keep it fairly simple? So...don't let on how much I love their house and how I've admired it for years? 🤣😬

There is of course a chance they contact us off the back of the note, allow us to view their property, and then once we actually see it we decide it's not what we thought. That feels really awkward...having contacted them to begin with 🫣

I'm not sure how much it would be worth now. It was close to the top of our price range back in 2021, but I'm not sure whether COVID skewed values somewhat?

Thanks!

What his intentions are is really not the point. And again, how do you know he introduces himself as a builder? How do you know he goes in a van? You have absolutely no idea. You are just making assumptions. the same as you are with this 'low ball offer' he's apparently making to all these vulnerable people on their doorstep.

What matters is the conversation he has when he's there. And I suspect it's probably not along the lines of:

'Hello mate, I was passing by and couldn't help noticing your roof is leaking, your render's cracked and your garden's overgrown. You look too old and probably asset-rich but cash poor to do all this work, so I think you should sell it to me. Don't bother with a proper valuation, no-one would be mad enough to buy it but me and I'll be doing you a favour by taking this heap of bricks off your hands. I'll take it and the 2 acres it sits on in Guildford for 85k and you can buy a little park home to see out your days in Hastings. How's that sound?'

Hopefully he's approaching people in a more respectful manner than that and he's as entitled to ask as anyone else. One of these days someone might be glad of the chance to sell up without estate agent's fees. But the point is, you don't know and you can't just make stuff up, like I just did.

And even if he did get a bargain off-market, sometimes people who can afford to take a bit of a hit would rather that, for a quick no-fuss sale than to have strangers traipsing all over their home for weeks on end every sunday afternoon and getting involved in long chains etc.

Would it have made any difference in the end though? Assuming you went ahead and sought several market appraisals and anyone buying it would have realised on viewing that it was probably a probate sale, or an elderly person going into a care home. I know you don't linke to think of the vultures circling, but a probate sale is always going to be susceptible to lower offers. a) they are often houses that in need of considerable money spent on them to update them and b) several beneficieries of someone's estate will often opt to have their share of the sale money quicker, even if it means getting a bit less each, rather than leaving the house empty for months while having to pay council tax on it for the sake of a higher offer which, once divided between several beneficieries, makes little difference.

Whereas a single vendor with a mortgage to repay will be holding out for the best price in order to fund their next purchase. Those speculative people may have ended up viewing it through your agent anyway.

People that do this when someone died are hoping the grieving relatives will sell direct to them without estate agents getting involved, and other people also getting to offer on it though. Agree with you that if they were always going to get it marketed that it wouldn't make a difference 🙂

The worst one was when we were fully gutting and renovating, people drove into our driveway, parked up and wandered in, and we found them looking around the house l/building site, while the builders were there.

That's a very good point, actually. They may just have driven by and thought it looked nice, but equally, you don't know what kind of research/nosying/boundary-crossing 'homework' they may done before deciding that they wanted it and approaching you.

The earlier joke about writing a note to the homeowners on the back of a photo of them might not be all that far-fetched sometimes!

It was just too soon and too raw. As I said, had they been more upfront I might have had a bit more respect for them and kept the note for future reference.

We ended up keeping the house for 8 months after he died. We didn't have to pay extra council tax, actually we didn't have to pay any and they refunded some that was paid previously whilst he was in a care home. It was dated but in good order so no worries about it deteriorating and I'm local so could check in.

The house is in an extremely sought after area so I wasn't worried about a quick sale, although it sold before it even went live on rightmove!

So you think he's actively looking out for run-down houses that need a lot of work doing to them in order to offer the same price as he would if they were in perfect condition? If he were genuinely looking for a low-priced doer-upper, why wouldn't he just go to auction? Is it maybe because there would then be other interested parties, so he would have to pay the actual market price?

And I never said that all of the householders would be vulnerable, but it's a lot more likely that the people who own a run-down, neglected house may be elderly and/or vulnerable than a smart, perfect one.

I think it's the actual knocking on the door that I find most objectionable - he could at least pop a note through the door, if he really is determined to try his luck. I wouldn't want somebody knocking on my door and asking if I want to order a pizza; much less trying to buy my house.

Elderly folk in particular - but anybody - can be susceptible to doorstep scams. How on earth do the occupants know that it isn't a distraction technique whilst an accomplice goes around to the back door? How do they know he isn't going to want to confirm that just one or two elderly people live there and not their 6'6" rugby-player grandson too? How do they know he isn't going to just overpower them and force his way inside? It's a very antisocial thing to do, not to mention potentially worrying, when people knock on your door seeking to instigate financial transactions.

This thread is full of a lot of paranoia! We live in a really lovely village, quite often we get notes through asking if we are selling up, often from estate agents. We have a great school, good amenities and are on the edge of two national parks.Houses rarely come up for sale. Not for one moment would I think anything else but they are just trying their luck. It would not cross my mind that I am being targeted or someone has been researching me! Maybe, very occasionally odd things happen and people might overstep the mark like the above story of someone wandering during a renovation but it’s not the end of the world, just tell them to fuck off. 99% of the time it’s just a person trying to find their dream home and being creative in how they do it. It’s clear this technique works sometimes so there’s nothing to lose, if the homeowners don’t want to sell they will just ignore it and then you have your answer.

Well let's be honest, NOBODY is going to offer the same price as if they were in perfect condition. They aren't going to be valued at the same price as a similar house in perfect condition. So that's a daft thing to say.

Not every doer upper goes to auction. The ones at auction tend to be unmortgageable for one reason or another, so only cash buyer developers will be interested. Just because he might have the good luck to snag something before it goes on the open market doesn't necessarily mean he's going to get it at a knockdown price and anyone with any sense would not agree a sale price to a speculative buyer without getting a few appraisals first.

All he's probably hoping for is getting in ahead of the crowd and not have to go into a bidding war. If he gets a bargain too, then so much the better. But it's not a given.

But yes, I take your point about knocking on the door. A polite note would be better.

Just with your first sentence... if you're determined to laugh off and make light of mental health and trauma issues that affect many, many people's lives - even though a number of us have told you of our own and family experiences and how distressing people may find it being approached personally and asked to sell their own home - you may as well just go ahead and do whatever you want.

If people are genuinely wanting to buy their dream home, and aren't looking to take advantage of the homeowners to pay under the market value, what on earth is stopping them from keeping their eyes open, activating alerts on Rightmove and being pro-active the minute they learn that the owners want to sell? You could even register your interest with all the estate agents in town that, if 43 Acacia Avenue ever comes on to their books, you're extremely keen to buy it and proceedable?

People who live in particularly appealing or unusual houses probably get bothered by these letters all the time. Even absent any MH issues or vulnerabilities, it really does detract from the joy of owning something when people are always bothering you and badgering you to sell it to them - as though they genuinely think that nobody else might also find it desirable. Most folk just want to be left alone, and are fully aware of how to advertise something for sale, should they wish to sell it.

I take your point that the actual value won't be the same as if it were in perfect condition - but he's hardly likely to only offer the perfect value minus the cost of fixing it, is he? He's going to want to bake in a decent profit.

And, regardless of the actual current value based on its condition, 'not wanting to get into a bidding war' is just another way of saying 'pay the owners less than its full market value'. You're trying to encourage people to sell themselves short on what is very likely their main financial asset, without initial/any recourse to a neutral professional valuer - however good your intentions may be, that is basically standard con-man territory.

I used to get these all the time! I lived in a gorgeous little rental property. just ignored them as I couldn't help. No harm in putting a note through as long as you're polite.

Exactly.

There’s no point approaching someone to buy their house if you haven’t sold yours and need to do so to proceed. I’ve just sold my house and didn’t properly look for a house until we were ready to go, there’s no point as you are likely to keep losing out on houses you like if you can’t sell yours, the market is currently tricky.

Agree knocking on the door is very inappropriate

akin to ‘can I do your drive love’ but far more invasive.

It is absolutely fine to do this if the person whose house you want to buy possibly hasn't even contemplated selling yet! They would need to get their affairs in order and find somewhere to live themselves one would assume. But yes, if looking to buy a house already up for sale, generally best to at least have your home on the market, if not already sold.

I do get the OP's hesitance though, knowing that houses suitable for her rarely come up. Often this place is rife with people horrified at awful vendors that are too picky and taking too long to find their onward purchase. In OP's situation she definitely needs the stars aligning to actually ever move (and not piss anyone off along the way!).

We moved last year. We were very specific with what we wanted and we didn't want to move area. There's no way we would have put our house on the market until we'd found the house we wanted to buy, otherwise we could have ended up either being forced to buy somewhere we didn't want or pulling out of our sale. We saw our house in March, put in an offer, put ours on the market, accepted an offer in June and the whole thing went through in the autumn. Meanwhile our seller had panicked and reduced it in the hope of a quick sale (unlikely in that price range) so we got it for a bit less than we originally offered.
I appreciate we were lucky but i don't get it - so often you don't even know you want to move until you see the house you want.
Unless you're looking to move to a specific area then you can sell.yours first and even rent while you're looking.
The English system is a bit rubbish.

Many people don’t have to move, and will only make the decision to move if they find there is something worth moving to. So no harm putting the feelers out to see if a house you like might be available. The seller obviously isn’t in a rush to move if their house isn’t yet on the market. So the timing of you selling your house and them finding an onward purchase could work well. And it saves them thousands in estate agent fees. So no harm in asking.

I don’t think the OP was going to knock, just a note through the door would suffice.

I was agreeing with someone who referenced another poster who’s dh knocks on peoples doors of properties that in his view are ‘run down’, not to OP.

It is absolutely fine to do this if the person whose house you want to buy possibly hasn't even contemplated selling yet! They would need to get their affairs in order and find somewhere to live themselves one would assume.

But this situation just underlines the absurdity of it all to me. I already have a home that I can afford, I like and which suits my requirements. Otherwise, it's extremely obvious how I would go about offering it for sale, along with seeking somewhere else that does work better for me, should I choose/need to.

I get that some people have tried the intrusive method and it's paid off for them; but I just can't fathom why people who are happy in their house would willingly go through all the hassle and expense of finding somewhere else equally suitable, just because somebody knocked or put a note through the door saying they wanted to buy it!

Someone did this to us 25 years ago, wrote a letter giving us all their details.

We replied to say we weren’t selling but would let them know if we ever changed our minds.

They have lived there 22 years now and brought up their family there.

I didn’t mind receiving the letter at all. It was lovely to know someone shared my feelings about that house.

It's a long shot, granted, but sometimes it pays off so no harm in trying.

Of course nobody is going to move if they're happy in their home, but occasionally people are toying with the idea of moving and something like this may give them a kick up the backside!

The note through the door policy will only work if the house owner "gets an offer they can't refuse" as it is soo good or they were half thinking of moving anyway @DalzielOrNoDalzielAndDontPascoe

It's always worth a try.
If you don't ask you won't get.

Even if this house was in the market, I doubt they would entertain an offer until you had a buyer.
My sister is an estate agent and she says the market is cautious at the moment. Mainly because the UK economy is shrinking and there’s a real possibility interest rates will go up again during the course of the year. Obviously there a still some houses that will sell really quickly due to demand in that area!

I heard people were buying to avoid the tax hike in April
Our conveyancer is snowed under at the moment.