Is this a cheeky offer?

[Laf90]

House listed in July at £425,000. Reduced the next month to £415,000. House still on the market no further reductions. Would you think £385,000 is a cheeky offer? My house is sstc, contracts currently being prepared. Haven't viewed the house as I don't want to waste anyone's time if the offer is unlikely to be accepted but agent has confirmed still available.

We offered 395k on 450k house spring 2023 and settled on 405k. Try it.

How can it be a cheeky offer without actually viewing the place ?

You might view it and think it is actually worth even less than what you think originally.

Also use houseprices.io and area360. Area360 will show the 10 year trends for house types in the area.

I would offer what you are willing to pay, if they say no you haven't lost anything. Just be clear that it is your best and final offer.

It’s hard to speculate if you don’t know anything about the seller. They might be able to accept a much lower offer, or they might be unable to financially. They might not want to and decide to wait. It really depends on their circumstances.

have look and make it really clear this is top top of your budget but you are ready to go (this is worth a lot!)

Interesting question, OP. I was wondering the same about cheeky offers. When a house is priced over a million, how much under can you realistically offer before it becomes a cheeky offer?

No such thing as a cheeky offer. You can offer whatever you like. Some sellers really need to sell and will accept an offer far below their asking price if there are no other offers. Others will not.

@rainingsnoring I understand what you're saying, but I think most sellers would have an idea of what they considered a cheeky/unacceptable offer.

It's helpful to hear other posters' experiences so you can feel reassured that your offer will not offend and you will continue to be taken seriously as a prospective buyer.

That's probably true.
Instead of trying to second guess the individual seller, and what they may consider cheeky, it's best just to make whatever you consider to be a fair offer, ignoring whatever the seller is asking, and take it from there. There is so much over valuation at present that lots of sellers are struggling to sell. Know your own local market and whether things are selling and at what sort of price. Overall, prices are falling in many areas.

That depends on how cheeky the listed price is. We had one I was interested in locally at 1m but were not in a position to move forward and it was obviously over priced. Eventually it was reduced to 910k, then 2 months later reduced again to 850k. The seller has now withdrawn it after no offers.
So in my opinion that 1m house is actually worth about 700k.
The point is lots of property is priced way, way over. Some is not (usually gone under offer in a couple of weeks if its correctly priced). You need to look at every property individually and offer what its worth to you.

We had ours listed as £1 million , and had an offer of 940k, the prospective buyer would only view ( other side of country ) if the offer was accepted

We thought about it over a weekend , discussed with our agent , accepted the offer , he viewed 2 days later

He was a cash buyer ( turned out that was not quite true , but it all worked out in the end )

How did you get on @Laf90

Oh wow, that's a huge over valuation. I've seen a house that is priced at £1.1m. As we're a single-income household and the interest rate for our new mortgage will be more than double our current rate, we don't want to go much over £1m, certainly not £1.1 (which actually wouldn't even be possible without depleting all our savings). Also, while the house is in a good location for us, it does need work so we have to factor that in too. But the worry is that we won't find anything better within the next few months.

I'm not saying they would sell at 700k. I'm saying thats what I would pay for it. However they probably would have taken a bit of an offer on the 850k I guess. Having started at 1m though they just put everyone off with their greed... kite flying in today's real estate situation is rife though in this area. Loads never sell and get withdrawn.

I mean you can ask but I wouldn’t accept that

An estate agent isn’t going to turn around and say there haven’t been any other offers are they!? They will says yes we’ve had lots of offers to make you panic and give your highest offer.

Not cheeky at all. Its been sitting for two months and already had one reduction, so the market has told the seller the price was the problem. You're proceedable with your own sale moving, which is genuinely worth money to a seller who's had no bites since July. Check the sold prices on the same street first (the sold tab on Rightmove pulls from Land Registry) and if £385k is in line with what similar houses actually went for, you're not cheeky, you're just sensible.

Thanks all, spoke with estate agent and they have lowered it to offers over £400,000 as of Friday. He said my offer would need to start with a 4 as they need a certain amount for their next house. I've said I'll leave it for now.

Not cheeky but unrealistic

the vendors will just stay put wont they. What’s the point?

It might be the case; it's up to them. There will be plenty of other houses for the OP, with sellers who will be willing to reduce their asking prices. There are several examples of this on the thread already. What the seller needs is irrelevant when it comes to the question of what the market will pay.

They may well want an offer beginning with £4 , however , a house is only worth as much as the best offer
If they really want to move then they may well have to lower their expectations again

I thought the Estate Agent was obliged to put forward any offer , not just the offers they thought were the correct offers

If you believe that, that's your choice.

Keep your eye on it. Every chance they will need to do another 25k reduction. Fingers crossed for you.

Is 400000 doable. 15 is not a huge difference if it’s the perfect house.

Good move, what they think they need for their next house is irrelevant to the market for their house, maybe they could drop their offer on that house?