Are some vendors just living in cloud cuckoo land?

[critterjitter]

I don't have a place to sell, so am supposedly in demand as a buyer! However, I've offered on a property twice in 6 months, to no avail!

Its on now for £309,0000. (previously on for £339,000 then £329,000). Its a probate (all paperwork done).

Its been on for nearly a year now! I offered them £300k six months ago, but they turned me down in favour of someone who offered higher, but was in a chain. Predictably, the sale fell through and the house went back on the market. And sat there, and sat there.

Six months later (this week), I offered them £250k. Bearing in mind that the market is collapsing and that the mortgage deals I have on offer to me now are very limited.

They reject again! How long before the house is valued at £250k anyway? It needs lots of work and we're in a falling market. So why don't vendors see that?

I agree with everyone who says it's not cheeky, it's realistic.

Some vendors are greedy. As someone said, why do people think that something can go UP 200% but not then go dwon 30%?

I think the fact that banks are asking for 25%+ deposits or equity demonstrates that they think 25% drops are very likely.

We've just had a greedy vendor turn down £190k CASH from FIL for a place that's on at £239k and is VASTLY overpriced imo. It's only a 2 bed bungalow! They are in cloud cuckoo land. I reckon it won't sell and in a year or so they'll bite his hand off for £160 odd

And the market has changed a LOT in the last six weeks, let alone the last six months!

Agree not cheeky at all.The place we have just withdrawn from was 27% down friom asking price and yesterday an agent from the auction house told me he had viewed it in the summer(as she planned to auction it if no buyers)and he recommended the auction guide be 60k less than we were pating so virtually half last summers £.If you look back on nethouseprices for the road you are buying in and average 2003 prices then that is about right imvho.

And I ask again, why is it cheeky for a buyer to offer less than they have before/less than the asking price/less than the sellers think it is worth....but not in any way cheeky for the seller to try and get more than it is worth/make a massive profit based solely on inflated prices?

Trixy your logic is full of holes, why should the OP still offer what she did 6 months ago when prices have done nothing but fall in the last 6 months?

I guess we can just hope that in the next 6 months it falls even more and that they would have counted themselves lucky to take your offer as it was!

But if you're not that fussed about buying it , why make another offer this week ? It is all a game and yes a house is only worth what someone is willing to pay at that time but they are getting very mixed messages from you as a purchaser.

In Feb I viewed a stunning victorian maisonette and we offered 235 it was on for 285.We were turned down and it 'sold' for 250 a few weeks later.It fell through in the summer and came back on at 250 then fell to 235 and sold this week.I know the agent and it went for 210 so really they would have been 25k up if they had taken our offer earlier this year PLUS they had already bought their next house with a bridging loan so are well out of pocket now.But of course it is ok for houses to rise 3 and 400% but not to come down 30 .

LIZS - I don't see how the seller can have got mixed messages. Critterjitter offered £300k six months ago, it is hardly a secret that prices have fallen since and are expected to keep falling with mortgage deals now much more limited. With this in mind she offered £250k as a cash buyer and has now made it clear that her offer is on the table for seven days and will not be increased.

That was smart - because the sellers may well have hoped that the £250k offer was an opening gambit and that if they rejected it, Critterjitter might increase her offer. Now they have a few days to reconsider their response.

But an offer is just an offer. All this crap about mixed messages is ridiculous. An offer is just that, not a personal affront on someone's dignity, she's not trying to make an impression on the seller. And if someone would turn down an offer because their sensibilities had been offended by "mixed messages" or because they took a disliking to the way a buyer had offered then more fool them. Not the way to sell a house.

That's it, noddy, all these people saying "well, I'm not surprised they won't sell to you, offering 27% LESS that the asking!!!!!" completely disregarding the fact that the house has probably risen anything up to 200% in the last few years, like that is normal!

its also a known fact that most agents "try" the market above the true value of the property and of course to win business from other agents

i say stick with it and good luck

Lazy line,

I probably didn't phrase what i meant quite correctly.

I don't think critter is offering too little money.

What I'm saying is that to the vendor critter appears as cheeky, and they would be more likely to sell to a new buyer offering the same money.

Seems we're in a 'no mans land' just now propertywise. Prices are falling but sellers don't want to accept that.

There are two sides though - we live in a flat and would dearly love to take the next step up and get a house with a garden. Most places this would be Ok but we live in Edinburgh (insane prices).

We're getting a guy round next week to give us a realistic appraisal of what we can get for our flat. We're hoping he'll say 240k, but in all honesty he may well say 210k or even less.

Of course 240k is a great price for a two bed flat in a rational world, but we don't live in a rational world. We need the 240k or else we can't sell as the next rung is just too big a leap.

There are worse problems than not being able to get a house with a garden, but it's not fair to say that vendors are simply greedy - until the whole market actually does come down in value and stuff starts shifting reliably at lower prices, we're all stuffed and nobody knows what's going to happen.

It's a total standoff and nobody knows what move to make. Btw, I saw that show with the people in Greenwich. Lovely house but yes, I know many people who have refused offers for being too low, then later had to accept even lower ones. More of this needs to happen for everybody to get the rose tinted specs off.

mrs miggins you could negotiate the reduction further up the chain.If yours is worth 15% less so is theirs and so on

I don't think I'm being cheeky! They turned down my £300k offer 6 months ago and that was the end of that! They've since tried to go through with a sale (that fell through) and then reduced the price twice. In the meantime, the market has changed significantly. I've made a new offer 6 months later based on the house and mortgage market now (not 6 months ago). If they'd have accepted my offer 6 months ago, they'd now have their money in the bank!

I'd say that this house will have a similar outcome to Noddy Holder's maisonette. They'll probably end up having to take £230k or something in the middle of a full blown slump.

I checked Prime Location tonight, and apart from the 2 other houses in the immediate area that have slashed approx £50k off their asking prices; one of the other (pricey) agents in the area also seems to have convinced the majority of their clients to have slashed approx £20-30k off their house prices. I'd say that most of the houses now in the area are on at about early 2006 prices.