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Any advice here would be appreciated.
We are moving from Surrey to Norfolk (my wife coming from there and really wanted move back, plus really good oppurtunity came up, not good to a mountain biker though).
We have already lost out on one house up here after the vendor pulled out a week before completion and are about to lose out on another property that we really like a lot due to what seems to be exaggeration of the properties worth by the estate agent.
Essentially the property was on market for £180.00, my wife wants to live in certain school catchment area, so restricted to one of five villages. Having lost one property and having completed on our Surrey property and currently living with in laws, we made a quick offer on the house of £176,000 and had it accepted and the purchase was going through fine until our mortgage lender had survey done and the surveyor valued it at £165,000. Lendor will now only lend us 85% of £165,00 and we don't really have the extra to make the difference up.
We did a Google search and it turns out property was purchased by vendor in Jan. 2011 for £140,000 (although they have fitted expensive kitchen and bathroom since).
We don't want to take a mortgage against the £165000 and pay £176000 for it, as if we will effectively be stuffed if we came to sell in 2-3 years and we are £10k+ down.
Our trouble was that the property is huge compared to ours in Surrey and not knowing the market in Norfolk the property seemed priced right.
Sorry to ramble, but anyone had experience of trying to get vendor to come down on a previously agreed price as estate agent seems to of given inflated value?
Have you tried going back to the vendor with the valuation and spoken with them? As if every valuation is going to come up at the £165,000 they wont get a sale!
Possible agree with vendor to have a independent valuation done to see what that shows up!
Surely just tell them about the valuation and be honest that you can't afford to pay any higher deposit, so you can only pay £165k (maybe email them a copy of the valuation to show you're not taking the piss and causing hassle). You've got nothing to lose, if they say no, then you can't buy the house anyway, if they say yes, everything is fine and dandy. If they say no, then tell them the offer of 165k is still open if they change their mind, and go and look for another house.
It's upto you at the end of the day. It was probably listed at £180k with them expecting to take offers around £165k.
You came along without doing any research and made their day offering £176k.
You'll just have to say you're pulling out unless you can re-negotiate to the banks valuation but if I was the owner I'd think it bad form on your part if I'd incurred costs due to your lack of preparation.
Its a buyers market and I would press home the fact that while you want the property the mortgage company have only valued it at £165,000. Its likely that any other mortgage company will do the same and that limits the vendor to cash buyers, and they are a tiny percentage of the market.
You need to play tough and be a complete bar steward 
Like this " Terribly sorry old chap!"
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I'm guessing that your lender is HSBC ??
Sounds like the lender's surveyor has saved your bacon.
Just motivate yourself for an awkward conversation with the vendor by visualising an extra four months living with the in-laws.
HSBC and their countrywide(or is it countrywise?) conveyancy doing their surveys .....
HSBC doing their EXCELLENT rates but you have to jump through 100 billion hoops to get it .....
we were advised to go no where near them if we wanted to complete ever.
This has just happened to my brother in law. He just went back to the seller and told them, they refused the lower offer and he pulled out.
About 5 days later he got a call from them saying they decided to accept the lower offer. Was about £10k difference as well.
^^^
Yep massive scam... You shell out 500 notes for the survey but never get the mortgage
Try another lender
As a vendor this happened to our buyer before xmas... HSBC reckoned 10k less than agreed price .. we said sorry about that, but we aren't dropping the price... sold the house again in feb for a couple of quid more and the survey has come back ok.
Mortage is from Lloyds TSB.
Just difficult as my wife had set her heart on the place, we had looked at a lot of places and the £180k valuation seemed fair, brand new kitchen, bathroom etc (the garage is a proper workshop was a winner for me) so having been messed about so much on previous property we viewed this on a wednesday and had agreed price by thursday afternoon, without the place ever being advertised.
Go into a local independent estate agent and ask then for advice on the real value of houses in the area. If you have an honest chat with one he will be able to go on zoopla and show you what houses have been really selling for.
What's in it for him? Well, he'll be able to look for a house you like and can afford if this one doesn't go through.
Nothing new. Just go back to the seller and inform them - and remind them you're free to move in ASAP.
If they need/want to sell then they will.
Thanks for all the advice.
Have a good weekend all.
Just remember the estate agent works for the vendor and is on a percentage!
East Anglian house prices should be a lot lower than Surrey. Unless you are in a commuter village, which is less likely in Norfolk.
I grew up in Suffolk and we thought about moving back after first sprog. Prices were miles under Hampshire except for places right on the london commute.
I really really would not over pay up there. It sounds to me like they have bpught the place, splashed cash on it thats disproportionate to the house value and then want to recover it plus profit, which is understandable but not necessarily realistic.
House prices generally pretty stagnant from what i have read over last six years. Some of the big professional valuers publish market sector reports.
Bought in 2011 not likely to have gone up much at all other than a few £k for the improvements I would have thought.
I am not an estate agent btw or a valuer I just watch the financial and property press as part of my work.
Property market is flat as a pancake anywhere but London and has been since banking crises. It is a buyers market and if your wife wants the property you wither need to have a tough chat about your lower offer or get a different mortgage and pay more.
"Property market is flat as a pancake anywhere but London"
this is wrong.
FWIW we did our mortgage through HSBC.
Sounds like a couple of people up there might just not have judged the value of the property very well too. We did ours, they came back with a value that was what it was on the market for (which we had agreed a price under) so everyone was happy.
Plus the rate they were doing at the time was insanely good for us as first time buyers!
Back to OP, as mentioned the estate agent is always going to try and get the most they can as theyll make more money out of it! I would agree with going back to them with the valuation and be straight with them!
the estate agent is always going to try and get the most they can as theyll make more money out of it!
That's not really true. The estate agent is aiming to get the highest sale price they can get that guarantees a sale.
Pushing the price up by 1000 gains them an extra tenner. Losing a sale loses them the best part of 2 grand. If they can encourage the seller to accept a few thousand less, they are better off than if you walk away.
[i]Pushing the price up by 1000 gains them an extra tenner. Losing a sale loses them the best part of 2 grand. If they can encourage the seller to accept a few thousand less, they are better off than if you walk away. [/i]
Which is why when you are selling its best to put the Estate Agent on to a tapered fee, ie once above a number let them have 10% of any extra (and a reduce amount below a certain number). That way its worth them getting an extra £1000.
We did this and got top dollar, and could've sold twice over even before the house had been advertised. Pure profit always focuses the mind.
Agree with all the people above saying go back to the vendor with the valuation and see if they'll drop the price.
Worst case scenario is they won't, and you're in the same situation you are now.
Your initial offer was very high anyway. I'd be a bit surprised if they wouldn't meet you halfway at the very least.
What do you think the house is worth? If you think the higher amount then find anther lender, if you think the valuation was fair then go back to the seller with revised offer.
Property market is flat as a pancake anywhere but London and has been since banking crises....
Where did you find that made up statistic ?
Bank of England Quarterly Report Table 2.14
Regional house prices - Average of Halifax and Nationwide
Percentage change on previous quarter
2012 Q2 Q3 Q4
UK -0.7 -0.4 0.6
Greater London 0.8 0.9 -0.5
South East -0.9 0.4 0.4
East Anglia -3.0 1.5 -0.7
South West -1.3 -0.2 2.1
East Midlands 0.2 -3.3 1.0
West Midlands 1.2 -1.8 -0.2
Yorks. & Humb. -3.1 1.2 -1.5
North West -1.4 -1.8 0.8
North 1.6 0.6 -2.6
Wales -1.6 0.0 1.9
Scotland 1.2 -2.1 3.0
N. Ireland -1.2 7.1 -9.6
[url= http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/education/Documents/targettwopointzero/data/downloads/datasheets/march2013chartpack.pdf ]BoE Report 6 March 2013[/url]
Table 2.16
RICS Survey
sales - average monthly number per estate agent over past three months
stocks - average monthly unsold stock per estate agent at the end of the month
2012 Sep Oct Nov Dec - 2013 Jan
sales 15 15 16 15 16
stocks 65 66 69 63 63
The long run average for sales per surveyor (branch) is 25.9.
[img] http://www.moneyweek.com/news-and-charts/economic-indicators/uk-house-prices/~/media/B418CFCF915B4C0DB3B7780E125FED87.ashx?w=550&h=294&as=1 [/img]
[img] http://www.moneyweek.com/news-and-charts/economic-indicators/~/media/29819F675780496B812CA00005D8243A.ashx?w=550&h=294&as=1 [/img]
so is that proof of your statement or is that you giving evidence showing your own arguement up ?
also love how it breaks down all of england into little pockets and scotlands just "scotland" - course there are no different areas there.
londoncentric statistics again
@ t_r
Would Hx and Nw have much data on Scotland anyway?
Its not the thirdworld
Why wouldnt they have data- they have a fair few branches up here an all
so is that proof of your statement or is that you giving evidence showing your own arguement up ?
Exactly what I was thinking.
Those figures show plenty of places with increases and decreases (not flat)
And even if they did say that those markets were flat (which they don't), the last 3/4 of 2012 doesn't really show that everywhere outside London has been flat since 2007/2008 does it ?
Don't get me wrong, I thought solicitors did all the Estate Agent stuff. And the data looks noisy anyway, and a jump of 5.1 for Scotland is second biggest after NI.
You still need a mortgage which goes through the banks
Te north east of scotlands going wild. It seems the market just went crazy again - made an offer over asking last feb and was outbid by 80k ( not a typo thats 80k)
Now this year 2 neighbours that have been on market for just under a year have folk fighting over them to buy.
Seems to be jan - june is the buying season up here - after june it goes dead from what i can see.
how long has the house been on the market? if a long time why has'nt it sold?
if a while, unless here is a reson why the people will not sell, i'd say the ball is in your court. get the agents to do the work, thats what the (lazy useless idiots) are paid for.
don't like estate agents, have yet to meet one who can actually sell.
It depends on where you are in the country but in the North West its flat or worse.