Buyers Survey - Anxiety!

[microwoods]

We put our house on the market in March for £300k and accepted an offer £10k over asking within a week. There was a lot of interest and we priced the house very competitively (£150k less than our neighbour sold for in Nov ‘24 and ours is bigger!). We did this because the house isn’t in great condition so we wanted to reflect the work that is required. It needs a new bathroom, kitchen, rewire etc.

Our buyer had a survey and now we are hearing that they are “very scared” by the results and want to have some quotes done to investigate further. We knew the survey would be scary as the house was built in 1840 and also obviously requires work (was sold as a doer upper and we did not try to hide any of the issues).

My concern is that we have very little wiggle room for our onward purchase. We got a mortgage offer for £5k more than we need in case we have to negotiate on price following the survey. We could stretch to taking £10k off if really necessary.

I am almost 39 weeks pregnant so really don’t want to lose this sale. I am also in love with our onward purchase and don’t want to risk it falling through. On the other hand, I don’t want to be taken for a ride when we could probably get another sale quite quickly, but there’s no guarantee that it would be over asking, and we might run into the same issues from another survey. We’d also have to facilitate viewings with a newborn, almost 2 year old toddler and dog.

I suppose the point I’m looking for advice on is, if you have been a buyer in this position, have you pushed to have the whole cost of the works unveiled by the survey taken off the purchase price? Is it a good sign that the buyer hasn’t just pulled out?

I’ve asked for more info on what exactly is concerning them and what work they are wanting quotes for.

I think they can get their extra quotes but you don't have to negotiate, especially if you think you can get another offer relatively easily. Imo it's best to get this out of the way early and resolved.

If it's their first house they will probably be more cautious but them being prepared doesn't mean they will walk away necessarily .
It's a horrible process buying and selling.

If they try to negotiate just tell the estate agent to tell the buyer that you have instructed them to go back to the other purchasers to see if they are still interested in the property as they had offered more than the revised offer.

It might be worth reminding them that you priced the house very low compared to a previous sale to reflect the amount of work needed and had a lot of interest as a result. Perhaps the agent can let them know that you will not be willing to negotiate on the price given this. Are they FTBs?

Thanks all for the advice!

They aren’t FTB but they are selling their home to FTB and the house we are purchasing is also chain free, so we are in a short chain. Our buyer is 4/5 weeks further on with her sale than we are as it took us a few weeks to find a house to purchase.

I don’t know a lot about the buyers circumstances except she was the first person to view the house (we were told at the time that she kept missing out on houses and was desperate to view) and she went straight to the office after her viewing to put in an offer for asking. We waited a week and by that time had another offer for asking. We asked her if she would increase her offer for us to take it off the market (we had another 7/8 viewings lined up alongside the other offer) and she offered the additional £10k.

We didn’t invite a bidding war with the other person that offered asking. We wanted to have it sorted quickly due to the pregnancy and apparently she was over the moon. I liked her as a buyer (though I didn’t meet her!) because she seemed really interested in the house which gave me confidence in the sale progressing.

I’m nervous about refusing to entertain negotiations at all in case she just walks away. The estate agent said that her main concern was something raised in the survey about the roof but as I said in the OP we’ve asked for more info. As far as we’re aware there’s no issue with the roof but obviously I’m not a roofer!

Surely this is why you have employed an agent? It’s their job to negotiate. They know all the tricks.
I get the feeling that your buyer offered because it was cheap and FOMO, and has now found out why it was cheap, a mass of building work.
It won’t come down to £10k, it will come down to her appetite for a renovation project.
The agent should be able to say It needs some work, but in the future. It’s perfectly livable. Move in for a year to give yourself time to understand the house. The roof doesn’t leak so no rush to do that. Fully renovated it will be X amount more. A house like this is a real bargain. Etc etc.

i wouldnt worry if she walks away as if your house is genuinely underpriced to reflect the work, someone else will snap it up.

Buying a home that requires a lot of work is scary indeed. Some people just jump on it without really realising what it involves and how much things cost these. You priced your house reflecting this need and honestly this sounds like a poor management from the real estate agent that did not make this clear to the buyer. Sounds like this person needs to make their minds soon rather than later, so you can try to get another offer quickly. Make sure when you receive an offer, the buyers are aware of the issues so they can't complain later.

Over a month on and we aren’t much further forward! After two builders the buyer has come back with a quote of £27,000 for various works including a new roof and some re-wiring (amongst other things). I’m going to query the roof in particular as we don’t have any leaks from the roof so I’m not sure why a new roof is required!

Anyway, what’s strange is that the EA has said that she doesn’t know what she wants to ask for, and do we have any thoughts. Surely she should be letting us know what she wants from us in order to proceed? Truth is, we won’t be giving her anywhere near £27,000. We were thinking of around £5,000!

I feel sorry for you dealing with this now - particularly as you presumably have a new little one to look after?

If your neighbour sold for £150K more and the work that is needed to your house is quoted at £27K, would it be worth considering doing the work yourselves and then selling it for a much higher price? I know it's probably not the best time to be thinking about this, but sounds sensible financially.

Normally if renegotiating then you would possibly go halves, as they are benefitting. But as you sold as a fixer upper I wouldn’t negotiate, especially in view of neighbours sale. It will require a bit of nerve on your part but I’d stick to the sale price. (I used to flip houses so have a bit of experience.)

I think you shot your self in the foot for marketing too low. If next door really sold for that much more and yours is bigger how much were you estimating it would cost to do yours up?
I prob wouldn’t negotiate. Did the buyers gets a valuation survey?

If it was priced low to account for the fixing up needed, you can forget about what they need to spend or do to fix it up.
I wouldn't negotiate in your situation and I would be really clear that it was already priced low to account for works needed.

This could be a case of an inexperienced surveyor not sure about the look of an old roof and saying it might be leaking, or might leak soon, then a builder going out and trying to get some work out of it. If it's an old natural slate, stone slate or tiled roof that isn't leaking, what does the surveyor (and builder) think the problem is? Seems quite dangerous to mess about doing work and spending money on a roof that isn't leaking to me... Have you got any photos of the roof?

You should inform your agent the house was priced to reflect the works needed to be done on the property, if it was all up together you would price similarly to your neighbours £450k. Let the buyers do the negotiating, don’t offer anything until you’ve heard from them. If I were you, I wouldn’t offer anything off because you’re selling £150k below market value it seems.

Make the first move.

Ask the agent to relay that you will offer £5k reduction as a gesture of goodwill. But to also relay that the house was priced well to begin with. Ask the buyers for a response within a week or you will relist.

Thanks for all your views, I appreciate the feedback. I think we did price it too low. We had it valued by the two best selling agents in our area and one valued it at £280,000 and the other £300,000-£315,000. He advised us to put it on at £300,000 because it would fall within more searches on Rightmove and he was confident we could get the price up if we could get more than one offer.

Both agents felt that although our neighbour’s house sold for £450,000 it was over priced and was on the market for 6 months before an offer was accepted. I didn’t want to be on the market for long.

Our situation is complicated by the seller of our proposed property sadly being near the end of their life, such that we are desperately trying to get this done to avoid dealing with probate (which may mean a 6 month delay or longer!).

I’m going to speak to the agent tomorrow but after speaking with DH we think we will offer the £5k reduction as a contribution towards the work as a gesture of good will, in the context of the house being sold as a doer upper. If that is unacceptable we will re-list the house and take our chances.

I was hoping to avoid re-listing as it might impact our purchase (which I am very emotionally invested in!) and we have a busy household with a dog, toddler who just turned two and a 4 week old baby. However, I don’t feel it makes financial sense to reduce the price any further when there was so much interest in the house to begin with.

We found lots of stuff on our survey but didn’t ask for a discount. We were aware the house needed work. The moth infestation and roof leak were nasty surprises after moving in but we still love the place.

Just updating this thread in case anyone goes looking in the future (I was looking for threads like this!)

After we offered to reduce by £5k the buyer refused and asked for £15k. We (very reluctantly) went up to £10k. Again she refused and held at £15k. I instructed the EA to ask if she wanted to reconsider her position otherwise we would re-list immediately. She agreed at £10k.

It’s not a good deal for us, but if we have any chance of getting this transaction done before our vendor dies it was worth it to me. I also really didn’t want to have to go back on the market and have viewings (we had 16 over two days the first time which is great because it was only two days but still it’s disruptive!). Further, I am conscious that not everyone wants such a big project, and we may fall into the same trap of a future buyer wanting to renegotiate or even pull out after the survey which will only delay things further.

So in the end we got asking for the house and will (hopefully) progress quickly now after this 8 week survey detour.

Good luck @microwoods I don't envy you going through the house buying and selling process with a baby and toddler. Hopefully the rest of the process will be smooth sailing.