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Original poster

The 'We want to buy a house' support group

245 replies

fruitstick · 16/09/2009 22:55

For like minded souls who are having trouble buying a house even though the property market is supposed to be on its knees.

We've had a vendor pull our, been gazumped and are horrified by the complete lack of any houses for sale at all.

So come share your woes here.

OP posts:
mooki · 30/09/2009 15:15

We've gone ahead and accepted our offer, which was for the asking price. (small controlled woop!)

Our house is in a less popular but ok area of Cambridge and was on the market for about 4 weeks. We're selling to someone who is renting, we both have solicitors in place and are ready to roll.

Am I right in thinking he now has to get a valuation / survey done?

Right, really need somewhere to come up for us but DH hoping for a dream home. (My experience is that dream homes are generally 25k over our budget.)

abgirl · 30/09/2009 16:59

mooki, yes your buyer needs to get their mortgage agreed in principle and then their survey would take place. After that searches and queries prior to exchange. Draft contracts and then actual contracts. Keep your fingers crossed!

Original poster
fruitstick · 30/09/2009 22:26

Well it appears that our landlord has changed his mind and we don't have to move out at all. Thank the lord!

We haven't told the letting agent we were supposed to be moving to next week though until we get something in writing from him.

It's a huge relief - we just need to find something to buy now!

OP posts:
goldenpeach · 30/09/2009 23:08

Mooki, whereabouts in Cambridge? Just out of curiosity as we are looking there. We want to move soon so we are considering renting but ideally want to buy. Funnily enough a house came back on the market today that was 'sold'. I am starting to see it in Cambridge now despite agents telling us it's such a great market. The house we lost previously to crazy outbidders (20K over asking price and needing everything done, ok location but not central) have not sold yet and it was June when we offered. We drove past and it's not inhabited (was a probatbe sale)nor it has not come through the land register. Really annoyed as we were ready to move in straightaway. So from the look of things, the spring bounce was as I suspected artificial and my DP checked that very few actual sales went through, despite the sold signs on the houses.

That's the thing in this country, a sold sign is meaningless.

Wigeon · 01/10/2009 08:51

Good news for several people! Glad you don't have to move out, fruitstick and congratulations mooki and abgirl!

Still no word from the estate agents about whether the people who offered on our house want to increase the offer - I'm guessing that's a "no" then...

DebiTheScot · 01/10/2009 09:53

you're right goldenpeach, the sold signs are misleading. I've got a few proprties on my rightmove shortlist which are underoffer as there are so many falling through just now.
And it means you can't get too excited about your own house being sold either.

abgirl- are you moving from and to Aldershot? We've got money through Thames Valley Housing and have been recommended to use a solicitor on their list who knows how their system works.

mooki · 01/10/2009 13:44

goldenpeach we're moving from Chesterton - north of the city.

It's a good place to live if you work on the science park and we've been happy there for 7 years but the local primary isn't brilliant and the road we're on is busy.

We're looking to move to Histon/Impington.

Where was the one you were after?

We've seen at least 2 houses which have had sales agreed on them, which have subsequently fallen through.

DebiTheScot · 02/10/2009 19:26

Had an offer accepted on a house . The one we went to see yesterday. Got that feeling and knew as soon as we walked in that we were buying it.

Excited but trying to stay calm about it too!

mooki · 02/10/2009 20:29

Good news DebiTheScot - did you offer the asking price or under?

Goldenpeach - I don't know if you've seenthis but you can access the Cambridge Property Newspaper online:
here

It comes out online on thursday night before it's in the shops on fridays.

DebiTheScot · 02/10/2009 21:06

We offered £13k under knowing they'd reject it but to see what their reaction was like. They then said they wanted £5k less than the asking price so we decided to just go for that if they took it off the market and didn't let the 7 lots of viewers in tomorrow.
We're still getting it for a good price so everyone's happy.

HouseHunting · 03/10/2009 08:54

Hi Wigeon we are in Hertford & are looking to stay here. Am going crazy with the lack of supply of houses We will be going into rented next month, which I am not thrilled about, but at least we will be in a great position. Good luck with your journey

Wigeon · 03/10/2009 18:30

Congratulations Debi! That's fantastic!

Bit of a pain about going rented HouseHunting, but as you say, you'll be a very attractive buyer.

We have had a few more viewings, and about half an hour ago got a pretty good offer (good for an opening gambit anyway), so agents are ringing up everyone else who sounded keen on Monday in the hope there might even be a bidding war. But am certainly not counting my chickens before they've hatched...

By the way, does anyone know if rightmove is the only website worth looking at, or whether you should also be looking at findaproperty or some other site? Basically, are we likely to be missing out on houses for sale by only using rightmove?

ABetaDad · 03/10/2009 18:53

I use Primelocation too but to be honest most houses on Rightmove are also on Primelocation.

Fizzylemonade · 04/10/2009 15:44

Ok, my house has been on the market for 4 weeks and I can see that loads of people (or maybe just one obsessed person ) keep clicking to look at it and yet no viewings booked.

Why do you think this may be house-hunters?

Do you think that maybe they are trying to sell theirs and hoping mine is still available?

Or do you think there are just very nosy people out there?

I use Rightmove and Globrix.com as it shows property on a map, it is fab.

rebl · 04/10/2009 16:18

Fizzylemonade - There are some very nosey people out there! I'm sure you will get some people who view who are just viewing to be nosey. Hope that all the clicks result in a viewing for you soon though.

goldenpeach · 04/10/2009 18:09

Mooki, good luck with it. I'm resigned to go into rental again. It will make it easier to househunt as we will be local at least.

We lost a rental house already and tomorrow we are going to see a house for rental and one that came back on the market (not sure about the latter, but the price is unusually good).

Even in the rental market there is huge competition as there isn't much available for families that is not over 1000 pounds.

spiralqueen · 05/10/2009 09:48

Fizzy we're looking for houses and the reasons we click on a house are that the house meets the main requirements in terms of right location/right size/right price but we would reject it if when we look at it and get more details it doesn't meet our specific requirements. E.g. we need a minimum of 3 good size bedrooms. If a house has two ok bedrooms and a box room there's no point in pursuing the house any further as it's wasting our time and the owners.

ABetaDad · 05/10/2009 10:10

spiral - like you, we never go and look at a house to rent or buy uness we are pretty sure we wil make an offer on it and have viewed it already on the internet.

There was a news article on BBC/Sky this morning talking about the impact of the internet on house buyng saying that pretty much it is going to take over from normal shop based estate agency. Frankly if it is not on Rightmove/Prelocation it is never going to get many viewings now.

I don't know why estate agents have shops anymore.

rebl · 05/10/2009 10:45

ABetaDad - To make it look like they're working for their commission.

Our move is going so so so slowly I think I could sit and watch paint dry and it would be faster moving. After speaking with NatWest last Tuesday and being assured that our mortgage offer would be in the post right away we've still not recieved it. I'm seriously starting to worry.

Rox73 · 05/10/2009 10:47

I read that article too. I never book actual viewings without looking online first.

What gets me is that there is no one single property aggregator you can go to, to get ALL property listings. Rightmove has most, but I prefer Globrix's site as you can search by close-ness to schools, I also use primelocation.

Agents have to pay a fee to rightmove and primelocation. Globrix is "free" to agents but it still doesn't seem to pick up all listings. I'm not sure why.

Wigeon · 05/10/2009 13:14

Fizzylemonade - it really puts me off if there aren't lots of photos of a house - and if there are no photos of a particular room / rooms then that makes me think there's something wrong with them (eg no photos of the bedrooms = they are pokey).

It's also really useful to have a floorplan.

And I know it shouldn't matter, but it really annoys me if the photos show the rooms / walls full of clutter!

Are you sure your house is competitively priced?

I also subscribe to the "nosey" theory - we were looking at rightmove months and months before we finally decided to sell our house!

I'm sure there would be lots of people willing to honestly critique your ad if you posted a link to it, if you're not too shy.

I hadn't come across Globrix - sounds like a good site!

Hope you get some viewings soon.

Wigeon · 05/10/2009 13:25

Oh, sorry, another question for Fizzylemonade: how can you see how many people are looking at your house on Rightmove? Is that because you are selling it directly yourself, not through an estate agent, or is there some way I can see how many hits we are getting (without asking my estate agent)?

HouseHunting · 05/10/2009 15:24

Oh, sorry, another question for Fizzylemonade: how can you see how many people are looking at your house on Rightmove?

I want to know this too!

DebiTheScot · 05/10/2009 18:22

I was wondering that too. Maybe it's not a good thing to know really though! Could just depress you.

We've almost appointed a solicitor so things might actualy start moving soon. A friend recommended one and then the EA we're buying through has a financial advisor who knows lots about the key worker schemes and he recommended the same ones and said if we sign up with them through him we'll get a discount. So just waiting for them to phone.

ThePrettiestStar · 05/10/2009 19:39

We have just had an offer on a house accepted. We plan to rent out our house as we have such a low mortgage on it.

I have an appointment with the mortgage broker that handled this house sale, tomorrow morning. She thinks we'll have no problems financing the new house but I am just biting my nails!

I love the new house so much and was delighted when they accepted our below the asking price offer. I am having sleepless nights over all of this and don't know how some of you deal with it so calmly....

I think I must have a harbringer of doom inside of me.

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