asking price??

hey all, we're currently looking at properties that have a guide price of 335k and are going to view a few next week. As a FTB do houses usually meet this price or are we expected to pay over this asking price? Basically if we li9ke one of the properties should we go straight in and bid at that price????
any advice as always is always welcome

ps: sorry, another question is do we agree to a sale with the seller prior to seeking a mortage with a lender?
thanks

Hi positive note,

You could probably add 15-25k to that depending on the area and the estate agent involved....

You'd be better off getting mortgage approval first. In my experience any time I even ring up about a place the estate agent asks if you're loan approved... Also, the whole process takes a while, especially with all the documents you have to get together and I think some vendors would rather take up an offer from someone who was approved rather than someone who has to go and find out first if they could get the money...
And asking prices - I have found that you can easily add between 20-40K to the asking price to get a realistic idea of what the house will sell for.

I thought that the IAVI (and IPAV?)) had recently dropped the use of "guide prices"? Shane Ross had some rant about it in last weekend's Sindo.

20-40K??? jasus thats a bit of a surprise. My ignorant self presumed that if you offered straight away what was being asked you would sucure it... what ever happened to the bargaining that goes on between buyer and sellers????

I jave been to the AIB and basically that gave me an idication of what i would be entitled to get and what the payments would be back on it.... as this was a meeting and nothing was signed does this count as mortage approval even if it is somewhat preliminary?

ClubMan said:

I thought that the IAVI (and IPAV?)) had recently dropped the use of "guide prices"? Shane Ross had some rant about it in last weekend's Sindo.

Click to expand...

They're now to be called 'advised minimum valuations' ([broken link removed]). A rose by any other name...?

positivenote said:

20-40K??? jasus thats a bit of a surprise.

Click to expand...

Not sure where you are looking, but to give you a couple of examples. I rang up about a house that was advertised for 325K. After it's first viewing it was up to 385. Another house I looked up was advertised for 335K and was up to 360K after the first viewing. So the way I see it, there is no point in looking at something that is advertised around the max you want to spend.

And what you have it something like "approval in principle", but if i was you I would try getting all the papers together ASAP. I've just about got all mine together now, but up-to-date bank statements and P60s and salary certs take a while to get together, especially if there is two of you. You'd be surprised....

thanks for the advice...
any chance of a full list of exactly what you need to gather together so i can do this / arrange this whilst we view houses?
Thanks

You need (for both of you)
bankstatements for the last 6 months
payslips for last three months
P60 (one bank wanted my last three, but that's unusal)
I.D (e.g. copy of passport)
Salary Certificate (usually a form comes with the application pack, but all the banks ask for the same info, so I just created a general one based on one of their forms with all the info required and gave that to my HR department and got them to issue a few for me)
Proof of current address (2 utility bills)
If you have savings, proof of that (i.e. statement)

I think that's pretty much it.

postive note - I know it's a shock, but it's true. We were looking in Lucan, and houses consistently sold for 20-40k more than the asking price. In fact, we stopped even looking at the asking price as a realistic figure. (Maybe the AMVs are closer, but I wouldn't hold my breath!)

You should certainly bid the asking price if that's still the lowest figure. Sure bid less than the asking price if you want. But the EA (and seller) are under no obligation to give it to the first bidder and can keep it on the market as long as they want, thereby attracting further bids and maybe triggering a bidding war.

You'll get advice from people on this forum on the best ways to put pressure on EAs to go sale agreed quickly. I won't go into them as I didn't take them (no reflection on the advice but rather my own impatience).

Perhaps you should go and see a lot of houses in the area, then follow ALL of these up with calls to the EA over the next week asking for the current bid and making out that you're interested. That way you can get some idea how much extra houses are fetching. This will enable you to judge a "fair" price (if such a thing exists anymore) for any properties you are interested in.

And yes, get loan approval first. If nothing else, it stops you looking at properties you simply can't afford.

I would look for mortgage approval first so you know where you stand and what price range to look for but I would start looking at houses ASAP. The approval process can take a while so at least you can get a feel for the market. I was surprised when I started looking, most places went for at least €40,000 over guide price. Infact doing searches in myhome I narrowed my max to €30,000 less than what it actually was because they just go up anyway. Good luck!

Depending if you are dealing directly with the bank or the broker, the approval in principle can take more or less time. It took me less than 2 days to get it directly with the bank. I think all the bidding process is a nightmare, and everyone is so "desperate" ( in a good way) to get their foot in the property ladder that bid way to high the "asking price" (or whatever new name they are giving to it now).
I just bid on a house, and it should go straight forward, although it happened to me before it all went badly, as the vendors pulled out of the deal after waiting for more than 3 months, after paying the 5% booking deposit, the solicitors holding the other 5% to sign the contracts, and the evalution/survey completed....Of course we got our 10% back, but because we applied for a 100% mortgages, have to pay interest on it, losing some money, etc. just so you are aware of the situation. It won't be harm if you ask your auctioneer if the vendors are ready to move to their new place/ if solicitors are arranged, etc etc..

Recently viewed a house priced at X.
Offered X-19k and told them the offer stood for 10 days, and if taken, Sale Agreed sign must go up.
They came back asking X-7. We stood our ground and got a call last minute on 10th day saying we got it........at X-19k.
Sale Agreed sign has gone up.
Left bank till afterwards.
Asking prices............+/- pies in skies.

AMV or previously known as guide price refers to auction prices.

Sinewave,

Where was that house?

Petal, if you don't mind I would like to keep that private until binding deposit is in place. AAM is just too popular!!
It wasn't in Dublin.

I thought so, in Dublin that wouldn't work unfortunately. WEll hope it all goes well for you and you're moving in soon!

so from the posted replies, the prices given on websites are just made up? How should we broach the situation, say if we see a house we like with a price we could strech to? should we make an offer minus a few thousand or go straight in to try and secure the property?
Is it a done thing to approach the seller privately and find out what they ae looking for or do we run the risk of the wrath of the estate agents??

once again thanks to all as the info/advice is always good

Is it fair to say that sale price is normally about 10% above the initially quoted price? Does anyone know are any estate agents worse or better than others when setting these AMV's?

Offer what you think the house is worth, or less if you think they will sell at this price.

If we all paid what we could afford, a bottle of milk would be about €20 by now.