Ok, so we’re in the nice position of being able to afford to buy our own home.
An oppertunity has come along that we can buy the sort of house we’re looking for at a good price. Its come to us via my step son’s parents in law. We know them and they have given us first refusal on it, prior to offering it to an estate agent.
I’ve never bought a house before and I know the traditional way to do this is via an estate agent, so Im looking for any positives, pitfalls or potential issues that may crop up.
Surely anything that avoids having to use an estate agent is good, isn’t it?
Your thoughts please?

Sounds fine to me

right from the start, for the comfort of both parties, I’d get a decent survey done (or a proper builder in to assess)

All the estate agent does in the ‘sale’ really is communicate anything with the buyers/vendors. The leg-work is done by the solicitor of the actual ‘work’. As you’ve already got lines of communication, the EA isn’t hugely important in all honesty.

There are no pitfalls. You do need to agree on a value. Look at houses onthe street/area that they go for. Then at mortgage agreement it’ll be valued again.

Find a Solicitor to instruct and thats it!

IMO – Estate Agents are great to use when you are the seller, want to advertise as far and as wide as possible to get the most money from the property at sale time.

If anything the seller is shooting himself inthe foot abit but then if hes getting the right price and has a buyer- no issue.

Are you really really sure it is a good price
I have recently moved and both buying and selling were tens of thousands below the asking price.
But if you are happy with the price and get a survey then fine.

Dont know if they are offering this as a probate or similar or offering you a bargain to hit a tight timeframe, but beware that all the searches take the same amount of time as if there was a long chain.
Our short chain sale was not as Ninja fast as we had hoped 🙁

N

I bought my first house from my sister so no agent involved. I bought our current house when a neighbour of my parents mentioned they’d put their house on the market that morning. So agent was involved but did nothing at all. The vendor decided to keep the agent on even though they had and could clearly show that they had sold the house themselves. The property hadn’t even had the details typed up let alone been marketed. So no you have no need to worry about the lack of an agent. Worth noting that the vendor is saving a lot of money so you might want to take that in to account with your offer.

Worth noting that the vendor is saving a lot of money so you might want to take that in to account with your offer

Couple of grand… not that much in the grand scheme of things.

Get it valued by some EA’s

A word of warning though, house buying/selling can turn the nicest most rational people into swivel eyed nut jobs.Are they a bit flakey?

But, if the seller is not an arse, the above is all good advice, get a proper survey and find a decent (not cheapest) solicitor.

I’d get – for peace of mind – two valuation surveys done (one on both sides – split the difference or some formula), and if you can find a warts and all surveyor, so much the better.

The potential for fall-outs if there are failures within next 18 months are rather large.

Try and get solicitors acting on both sides independently too.

same as any other sale, however I think there are potential pitfalls (*however I’m a dour Scot) – you may want to stay friends after ….. not always the case when money involved/problems are found.

so I’d get a full survey (unless modern house) and get heating, leccy wiring etc etc checked and then I’d discreteley go round(preferably with a knowledgeable person – as they might be better than a full structural) and have the carpets up/in the loft/corners etc etc looking for problems/damp etc etc etc).
value is always contentious so you need to (both*) be comfortable with the price.

I’d also do all the std checks – neighbours, parking, subsidence/flooding, nearby ‘potential problems’ etc etc – to make sure you really want to live there.

Buyer beware – after sale any issue is your problem not there’s, though if they lie about something that’s a problem you’d have to deal with or swallow.

so I’d get a full survey (unless modern house)

i get a survey with a modern house, my mate’s 4 yr old house is falling apart.

A full detailed survey is a given.
They’re not friends as such, more acquaintances through family. They’re nice people, although im aware that money matter can turn some normal people into nutters.
The price is good to low for the property size and condition. We’ve been looking for 6 months or so and this is about £5-10k lower than most.
Its very similar to out current rented house, but overall better in most aspects. Its only about half a mile from where we are now and know the area well as I’ve lived in the town for about 15 years now.
They had it on the market 2 years ago for much the same price, but took it off because they were going abroad for 2 months. Plus the market has been pretty stagnant and they weren’t in a rush to move.

this is about £5-10k lower than most

asking prices or selling prices?

weekly while a couple of grand may be loose change to you it’s a reasonable sum to others well worthy of a what X for 2 grand post 🙂

Treat it like an ordinary house purchase – they are not doing you a favour, whatever price they are selling it for.

If anything is wrong with it, you need to be able to walk away as easily as if you were buying from a stranger.

Thats the general plan, Im still going to try and knock them down a bit, after all no normal person asks for the figure they want, its always above that.
We’re probably going to have another look at the weekend and then if its still looking like its a goer we’ll get a proper survey done.
There is no obligation to buy and thats fine with both sides.
I guess their view is it’ll save them a few grand in EA fees so its more for their benefit than ours.

We sold ours to my wife’s Best friends sister who is quite intense, We used the estate agent for communication only for a fee of £500. Glad we did.

Phew, 2nd visit has confirmed to us that its the right size etc for what we want, the price is good and its in great nick with no apparent work required for some time and we like it, it feels “right”.
So we agreed a price with the seller on Sunday, so go to make an appointment with the Financial adviser and the earliest appt they can offer is Wednesday the 10th April. FFS.
I hope this isn’t an omen…..

Not got round to updating this thread. For those that may be interested, we pressed on and purchased the house and finally moved in mid-August. Still settling in now, but its getting there.
Need to sort the garden out a bit, do a bit of painting over the winter and get a proper bike shed sorted.
Other than that its all mine mwahahahah.

I bought my house in a private sale, we had it valued independently and split the saving from not using an EA 50:50.