am i being foolish to try to negotiate a sale price?

[canella]

We moved abroad 6n months ago and our house in the UK has lain empty since (were supposed to rent it out but it all fell apart so we out it on the market).

Its a 4 bed detached in the NW of England - was originally on the market for £185,000 - loads of viewings but no offers (sorry - had 1 offer but the guy was bogus - he had no funds). Dropped it to £175,000 and we've now had a cash offer of £160,000. The estate agents are waiting for proof of funds before they make a formal offer but dh wants to make them negotiate up to around the £170,000 mark.

Are we being foolish or just greedy? we've only got a small mortgage so accepting £160,000 would still give us a large profit? i've emailed the estate agent back but wonder if we've lose our only offer?

ignore the n after 6 months!! bad typing!

Given that it's been on the market 6 mths with lots of viewings and no genuine offers taking a 15% drop in your original asking price isn't too horrific in this market especially if they are cash buyers with no chain to worry about. I'd be inclined to go back and initially say that you'd accept £170,000 and then hope to meet the buyers half way.

We've just sold in 3 months in the NW. We took a 7% hit on the asking price. But where we are buying the agreed purchase price is 6% off asking price but I think we're going to be renegoiating the purchase price given our survey report. So I would say £160k from your current asking price is good. Maybe try and get a bit more out of them, maybe another £5k but I wouldn't loose the sale over it.

thats good news rebl that yours sold so quickly!

just waiting to hear back from the estate agents! we've no chain and they've no chain so if it was up to me i'd be tempted just to take their offer!! but dh is driving me mad with not wanting to appear like a fool and just accept the first proper offer we've had.

but no-one really expects their first offer to be accepted do they?