House pricing rant

[Mt563]

Why does house pricing seem so random sometimes? I'm guessing sellers?

I'm getting a little frustrated with houses on the market overvalued but clearly seller is happy to wait ad infinitum for the price they have in mind. Like, over a year on market, clearly overpriced, but no price drop and not open to offers.

I'm looking at 2 houses, next to each other on the same road.
One fully renovated, new everything, modernised layout, about 15% smaller, on at 425. But went on last spring so likely overpriced and/or not accepting offers.
Second one, needs all new windows, boiler, kitchen, bathrooms etc. Layout would benefit from modernisation. On at 'offers in the region of' 500. Given how much work it needs (plus the optional stuff) this price seems well over to me.

Rant over.

If they are refusing to drop the price then they would probably rather not sell at all than sell for less than they want.

Maybe they are potential downsizers and it’s only worth their while if they can get a certain price. Maybe they would be in negative equity. Maybe they can’t afford to move unless they achieve a certain price. Who knows. What other houses sell for is irrelevant if the seller isn’t willing to sell at that price. If another house on the street becomes available then OP can buy that one! Or maybe she’ll get outbid if it’s a popular street.

Depends. Tories have said that they would abolish stamp duty. That might get the market moving.

OP you need to remember that not everyone with a house on the market needs to sell. Lots of people will only sell if the can get a certain amount, and if they can’t get that, they’d rather stay where they are. This is particularly the case if the next step up on retirement downsize properties haven’t shifted much in price. If they can’t get that price, then they are happy to not move.

But if the house is what you want, it’s worth an hour of your time to go view it, then put in an offer at the level you think is reasonable, even if it’s considerably below the asking price. They can only say no.

Why would it drop? I can't see any Government rejecting other people's money 😁they'll need more and more for pensions, benefits, and servicing debt.

To encourage growth, it’s the only tried and tested way.

Not happening.

It’s inevitable. Labours tax targets have been purely ideological and aimed at growth enablers so far: businesses, energy, education and high earners. Each 1% point on unemployment costs £10 billion a year. Inevitable it has to come down and thats before you factor in the new government is reform.

That’s a sweeping generalisation! I’ve had 4 valuations today. One agent put a new instruction on 30th April at 525k and it went at asking in 24 hours. They had a number of other go under offer in the last few days, there’s been a bit of a burst of activity the last week ago, the interest rate hold has apparently helped and he was saying Barclays and a few others now have under 4% products.

Another said they usually average over the month 30 properties going under offer and are down now to 20 a month. So down a third but still selling, A new estate agent opened here in February, they are from nearby city and I think trying to catch some of the people moving out from there as here you get more house for the money and there’s a station.

I started a spreadsheet 2 weeks ago and had 20 houses on it at the start that could be of interest, 4 or 5 have now gone under offer.

2 agents were saying they have issues with other agents giving inflated prices on dated properties to get the business and then the vendor won’t reduce and hasn’t grasped the increased cost of doing work .

We’re going to go on market and see what happens. If we get an offer we’ll see what we can get. If it comes to it we’ll stay here but hopefully we can move and have asked them all to give realistic valuations, time will tell.

If house 1 is nicer inside and less money, why don’t you offer on that one?

It's a little smaller and the access isn't as good. If condition was similar, house 2 would still be more expensive but I'd definitely prefer it if possible. I do also like the potential of it.

Good to know the term. It seems much more common than I expected where I'm looking. There are a number of properties that were on the market Spring/Summer last year and have now come back on again, some for 30-40k less, some for exactly the same.

It’s difficult to say without seeing the properties, but you could easily have the situation you described on two properties. Cost up what each feature is worth…

• detached vs semi vs terraced
• drive vs no drive
• right of way vs no right of way
• side access / no side access
• period property features / no features

The house next to us is up for sale for £400k. Ours sold for £550k. Next door to each other, both 3 beds… on the market at the same time, they still haven’t sold.

Location alone doesn’t make 2 houses comparable.

No! Never buy a house from a nut job seller. Even if they drop the house to £400k (they won’t) if they are that deluded they will be a nightmare to deal with.

Sadly I speak from experience. Find a sane seller if you possibly can, moving house is stressful enough without some fucker deliberately adding to it.

Why would they worry less when Labour is gone? The "10 Year Yield" controls debt costs for mortgages etc. What party do you think will calm bond markets and make people worry less?

Can"t see the Tories having a majority at the next election TBH, the last stamp duty stunt just put the people coming off fixes now into a much worse financial position, you need really low mortgage debt rates for these developer bail out stunts to work.

I do think the market seems particularly bonkers at the moment pricing-wise - my read is that we’re seeing a real time split between sellers who have accepted the reality of the plummeting market.. and those who have not!

If it was a popular street the KIte Flyer wouldn"t be going through the mental gymnastics of pretending their house has somehow been assigned a special value, maybe the street is popular, but at lower prices?

That’s a sweeping generalisation! I’ve had 4 valuations today. One agent put a new instruction on 30th April at 525k and it went at asking in 24 hours. They had a number of other go under offer in the last few days, there’s been a bit of a burst of activity the last week ago, the interest rate hold has apparently helped and he was saying Barclays and a few others now have under 4% products.

Agents do tend to talk up the markets to sellers I think.

Of course it is worth viewing. If you like it then you can offer what you think it’s worth.

Agree but you can see things going under offer on RM which I am watching carefully, some might say obsessively ! All 4 agents were honest and said the market obviously isn’t good but some things are selling and that reflects what I am seeing on RM. Anything that needs work isn’t getting anywhere as a rule.

We have decided to go for it and see what happens, I’m not expecting much to happen and that’s fine as we don’t have to move.

Can"t see 4% lasting, you would still be buying at bubble prices and could come off a fix in a few years to much higher rates, better to get the house as cheaply as possible, get the initial debt down as low as possible.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/halifax-cuts-its-mortgage-rates-but-are-home-loans-about-to-spike-again/ar-AA22w1oe

Yes quite possibly but I think the past has shown it is hard to predict with any certainty what will happen. I took a 5 year fix as everyone said rates were going up then soon after they plummeted. We can speculate all we like but we just don’t know what is round the corner.

Some people just aren’t motivated sellers. They go on market at an overly optimistic price, hoping some
fool might pay it, but if not they are happy to stay put for months / years. They don’t have to move.

You what? So if I say my house is worth ten million quid, under your logic if someone won't pay it, it just means that "you aren't the right buyer and [I] would rather keep it because it is worth more than your offer to [me]". You do understand that's not how economics worth, right? I mean if there are no "right buyers" prepared to pay ten million for my house, it's because it's value isn't ten million pounds. Jeez, no wonder people like the OP are feeling a bit defeated. The value is what the market will pay, not what I think its worth. "Your unwillingness to pay the minimum that its current owner will accept does not mean it is overvalued." Err, if no one will pay it - as is the case here - overvalued is exactly what it is. The owner's views on the value are entirely irrelevant.

So are you suggesting that the buyer sets the price, not the seller?
That would work if there was an infinite supply of the product for whether there is a limited supply of the product it’s the complete opposite
So either we need to build more houses to dilute the value of the existing stock.
Or people who want to buy a house will be dictated to by those who want to sell one
Locally I’m on two Facebook pages of surrounding area areas where they want to build 1500 houses in one and 600 houses in the other
Everyone is up in arms Theres objections to both. So I guess we’ll see.