….yesterday at approx 5:30pm.

Not had any response from the estate agent yet. I have sold my house and am in temporary rented accommodation so effectively a cash buyer.

The offer was 7.5% below the asking price so not ridiculous – I have called the agent but the person I need to speak to is “out”

Am I right to be peeved? – I guess I should have set a deadline when making the offer but I thought that in the current climate they would be a bit more proactive.

If you can’t wait 24 hours to hear back about an offer your really going to explode with the rest of the process.

Keep looking! It’s a buyer’s market.

Agents are often a hinderance to a smooth transaction.

When buying I try to bypass them as much as possible because I found they couldn’t even pass on a simple message in a timely manner and managed to confuse the whole process.

To think that they charge vendor’s huge sums for their services is quite exasperating.

There must be a few good one’s out there however.

From my experience that just sounds like a typical estate agent. When we were buying they seemed to do very little “selling” until we put in an over the asking price offer on one house (but were out bid).

Best bet I found (in my limited experience of 1 purchase) is to act like you don’t give a sh*t. Put in a low bid, don’t chase it at all. If they get a higher bid, they’ll come back to you to see if you can beat it.

You chase them = you’re keen = you’ll pay more.

Tell them you’ve seen other places that you are interested in, point out all the bad points about the property, then put in a v low offer. You can always increase it later. If necessary view other properties with the same agent – the agent will prob mention this to the seller, which might make them panic and accept your offer.

The agent told me that they have two viewings booked for Saturday so I guess that they may be waiting for those to happen before getting back to me.

If this is the case it would have been nice to have been informed of the fact.

Should I have said that the offer was only good for 24 hours? – what negotiating techniques have people used (and how successful were they?)

Should I have said that the offer was only good for 24 hours? – what negotiating techniques have people used (and how successful were they?)

That’s our offer we have nothing to sell and that’s our only offer. Turns out the guy like us, like what I do for a living and took our hand off the house never even appeared on the market fully.

Thanks JD,

Good tips.

Unfortunately the agent does not have anything else on their books that we can plausibly look at.

The question is, how much of a sought after area are you looking in?
The houses where we’re looking go very quickly so the usual negotiating tricks don’t necessarily apply.

Unfortunately the agent does not have anything else on their books that we can plausibly look at.

Other agents are available 🙄

If you can’t wait 24 hours to hear back about an offer your really going to explode with the rest of the process.

+1

I put in a low offer, of 110k on a property listed (cheap in my opinion) at 125k. They declined but dropped 5k off the asking to 120k. I increased my offer to 114k and said final offer, take it or leave it.

Heard nothing for a week, they then contacted me to say 116k. I said no, even though I’d have paid the original asking of 125k.

They then phoned a couple of days later and said they’d accept 114k, but it would be nice if I’d make a gesture of paying 115. I kinda laughed at paying an extra grand for no reason, and said 114, which is what we eventually agreed upon (took 6 months for the deal to go through with chain breaking).

If you act like you don’t care, then they’re more likely to accept a lower offer, than if they cotton onto the fact that you actually love the property.

The estate agent just wants a sale – a few extra grand to them on the sale price is nothing to them in commission – a cheap sale for them is far better than telling the seller to hold out for a higher price and risking losing a buyer.

Cletus. You any good at the Banjo?

no point in setting a 24hr deadline in my opinion, there are too many variables involved such as getting hold of the vendor, them mulling it over with whoever, adjusting their bids for their following purchase etc. If I was in the vendors position knowing that there are 2 more viewings on Saturday I would certainly wait to see if there is any further interest generated.

“I have sold my house and am in temporary rented accommodation so effectively a cash buyer.” So you will not be getting any kind of mortgage ?

Set a 24hr criteria if you like, but what happens if they break it will you walk away and not come back? There will be other people interested (possibly) not just yourself.

Ive always tried to get a contact for the vendor. For some reason agents dont like you getting hold of their details, but things normally happen alot quicker if you speak irect to the vendor and not the agent.