Can a buyer 'come back'?

[AInightingale]

Sorry if this is confusing. We are selling my parents' house atm. The market is pretty buoyant and we had a lot of interest when it first went up for sale, increasing more than £20K in the first week. We accepted the strongest offer (a guy who had no chain and large deposit), but when it was surveyed, the bank refused his mortgage on the grounds that it needed more spent on it than they were prepared to lend.

It's now back on the open market, at the original asking price. Again there's a lot of interest, but I am wondering if our 'buyer' will pop up again. So far there's been no sign of him, but is there anything to stop him putting in another bid in the hope that it won't be so feverish this time? That is, that he gets the house for less than he bid on the first occasion? I was just wondering how common this is, and I'm also a bit suspicious that it may be open to abuse, ie outbidding everyone else in order to crash the sale and take the price right back down again.

Just make him another offer

Ask your agent to go back to him.

My DS had an offer turned down, he increased to his maximum, but still declined.

He went on holiday.

Came back to a message was he still looking as they would now accept his final offer.

Luckily for them, he was still looking but hadn't done anything in that timeframe because he was away.

I would recommend you are proactive though. Don't just assume he will as most people looking simply move on when they get declined.

You don't have to accept his offer if he makes one

If he was dead set on buying he could/should have tried to negotiate with you at the point the mortgage was refused, in order to keep the chain together. Seems a waste of time to wait for it to come back on the market to then offer less, when he was already in the process with you to begin with...no?

Surely if he was prepared to buy it for less he'd have just offered less at the time? It's up to you which buyer you accept.

Yes I was thinking that too. He did seem very keen, which makes it odd that he just dropped out completely without negotiation. Or perhaps we/the EA should have negotiated with him? We might have got more for it than we eventually will, settled for the asking price +£10K say. No guarantee that it will go so high again. Oh well, too late now.

Maybe he has a set budget in mind that he wants to pay.

I'm also a bit suspicious that it may be open to abuse, ie outbidding everyone else in order to crash the sale and take the price right back down again

Why do you think he's some sort of arch-supervillain? He offered on a house, his mortgage company wouldn't lend him that amount because they, the mortgage company, didn't think the house was worth that amount, so he didn't buy it.

He didn't so anything!

I don't think you need a conspiracy theory here.

He offered over asking - by quite a bit! The mortgage company have no emotion in this game and they will only lend on what they think the value is, so they downvalued for mortgage purposes which is not uncommon when offers are accepted over.

But presumably that wouldn't have helped if he needed a mortgage to buy the house and fhe mortgage company wouldn't lend?

You are massively overthinking this. I don't understand why you think so badly of him he didn't do anything wrong. His mortgage company refused to lend them as much as he needed to buy it at the price you wanted. Sometimes that's a reasonable decision and other times it's really not, but it is what it is. Why do you think he would deliberately set out to undermine another sale? If you are prepared to drop the price there is nothing stopping you getting the agent to go back to him with the price you are now happy to get he may be able to make that work with the bank and you know he likes the house.

He didn’t do anything wrong, not sure why you would think he would try to ruin a new sale? The chances are it will be undervalued again and that’s what will ruin the sale

I’m perplexed why you didn’t discuss negotiations? Didn’t the EA recommend meeting in the middle to keep the buyer? Surely if he’s had this issue, most others will?

I had a man see our house, he put in the highest bid, which I accepted, he then dropped out, as week later he rang to view again and I told the estate agent not a chance! I didn’t want a flaky buyer.

You can accept any offer you want for any reason.

I can’t understand what the problem is. He offered X amount, his mortgage wasn’t approved so he dropped out. He didn’t offer less and you didn’t reduce the price so both of you moved on . He probably found something else in the meantime or maybe just thinking about his mortgage options.
Do you want your EA to contact him again and check if he is still interested? If yes, do it.
If you don’t want to have a deal with him for some reason just don’t. Simple.

I really don’t understand your thought process hers. Why would he try to sabotage any new sale?

Yes he can come back and offer again if he wants to. You can either accept or decline if he does. Stop overthinking it.

Thanks everyone. Yeah i thought he would be more persistent the way he kept increasing his bid, but he just seemed to disappear when the bank decided he'd overstretched himself. Just seemed odd. Anyway he's wasted enough of our time, I hope we've seen the last of him!

Maybe more property has come to market to choose from?

Certainly in my DS area where he's been looking for nearly a year the market has a lot more property to choose from now than in 2024.

I'd say we were seeing about 15 - 20 new properties a week in his range in 2024. It's easily double that now.

I hope we've seen the last of him!

Well, there's no reason to think that he wants to buy it. Otherwise he would have negotiated instead of walking away.

He's probably bought a different house.

Most people would be asking their agent to follow up any buyers that had been previously interested in the hope that they would consider buying it.

Of course he could make another offer at any time but he’s highly unlikely to do so, and it’s your choice whether to accept it or not. People do often get overexcited about the whole viewing/offer-making process, but once the thrill of the chase fades, they lose interest and move on to the next one.

It’s not clear whether your buyer failed affordability meaning he couldn’t borrow as much as he wanted, or his mortgage survey valued your house at less than his offer. If the latter, be prepared for this to possibly happen again with a subsequent buyer.

Perhaps I'm missing something, but if he had a large deposit and the lender still didn't want to lend the amount asked for, then to me that suggests the house is seriously overpriced.

Regardless, if he was turned down for his mortgage then he's no use to you and I'm not sure why you're so focused on him. He sounds like he's all mouth and no trousers, as my mother used to say.

Are you serious? The mortgage was rejected because the property wasn’t valued highly enough! He hasn’t wasted your time at all, nor has this anything to do with him overstretching himself.

but when it was surveyed, the bank refused his mortgage on the grounds that it needed more spent on it than they were prepared to lend.

I'd be more worried that the bank won't lend what you think the house is worth vz what the bank think it's worth.
It must have been quite a big difference for him to walk away.
Like others have said he did nothing wrong.