Disappointed over losing out on house

P

Petal

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After having had a bid in for over 3 weeks and waiting and hoping, finally someone came in with a 5K higher bid. Not knowing whether the EA was trying to squeeze money out of us we were somewhat vague and hesitant about bidding against a higher bid, and due to all this we lost out on the house as it went sale agreed the next day...
The EA was supposed to ring back and it all came down to some misunderstandings. I am very disappointed and would just like to walk away from the whole house buying business....
 
Could you not save yourself some of the heartache and buy a new house?

This is something I am seriously considering doing as it avoids

(a) entering the bidding process
(b) stamp duty (as long as the floor area is under 125 sq metres).

Buying new also has it's disadvantages, the key ones for me being:

(a) quality
(b) choice (more affordable houses tend to be in less accessible areas)
(c) waiting lists/queueing/dragged out completion dates
(d) management fees

But the more and more I think about, the more I feel that we will be better off buying new. Bar a fairly incompetent solicitor, or first purchase (a new apartment) was a fairly stress-less process.
 
Well, I really want to stay in the City and I've been looking in Dublin 12. I don't have a car and don't want to have to have a car to do shopping etc. I'm also not keen on commuting, half my work colleagues keep telling me horrendous stories about commuting, and the other half's family are from the Dublin 12 area and I don't want to be too far away from the family network. And most of the new houses that are being built are like cardboard boxes. Really small and you can hear everything the neighbours do...
I know I'm being picky and not very open to compromising but I haven't given up hope yet... I am still in the run for another house, but they keep stringing us along as well. I think I'll put my foot down tomorrow and say they either accept our offer or leave it...
 
There are generally compromises involved. My gf never thought she would be happy on the Northside, but there you go!

We need a car to do our weekly shopping (well we could use taxis I guess) and also to visit the inlaws and my origins. If you feel very strongly about it, then fair enough. But it wouldn't cost the earth (well some Greens might argue otherwise!) to keep a small runaround on the road just for essential weekend/evening trips.

Noise doesn't really bother me. I have come to accept it as a fact of life since I moved to Dublin. I can hear neighbours walking around, I also live in the Dublin flightpath and within a stone's throw of the Dublin/Belfast railway line. All in all, one of the noisiest neighbourhoods in Dublin I'd say but that wouldn't make me leave.

When you say commuting, I presume you are talking of places life Mullingar, Enfield, Dundalk etc. Too far out for me as well, but there is still a fair bit of choice on the rail/DART network that is still in the greater Dublin area.

Either way, it seems to me that you just cannot have your cake and eat it in Ireland (Dublin) these days unless you have a serious amount of cash. We had to make compromises/sacrafices and will no doubt have to do so again. I've come to accept it as a fact of life these days.

By all means put your foot down and walk away. Don't spend a penny more than you feel any place is worth.
 
Yeah, I'm gonna get on to the EA tomorrow and tell him that my patience is running thin. I worked out that I had that offer in for at least 3.5 weeks and they're just keeping us as backup, hoping to get more... Not fair on us really.
And I know what you're saying. I guess as long as there is any chance of us getting a house where we'd like to be we'll try, eventually we'll have to compromise, the speed at which house-prices go up, if we don't find one soon, we won't be able to afford one anymore.
 
I can understand you being disappointed but wasn't this your own fault by not being clearer on being prepared to match/exceed the top bid if that was your intention?
 
Well, I do recognise the fact that I didn't give a straight forward answer, but the way the conversation went was that he was to ring me back to let me know if the other party got loan approval and if their bid went ahead. I never got that call and after having me wait for a month you'd think they would let you know that the other bidder's (who had come on the scence that day) bid was about to go for sale agreed and did you want to match/exceed it.
 

My heart goes out to you. We were in a similar situation before we bought our house and I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

One evening the EA phones and says "Congratulations - the house is yours". 24 hours later he phones and says "Eh, they've accepted a higher offer so we'll now go to best and final offer". Which we lost out on.

We ended up buying a better house for less money so, hopefully you too can look back on this put it down to experience .
 
My feelings to go to Petal. am newish to this game too. built my own house nearly 30 years ago. ( site and house under £10,000 ) but that was a long time ago and interest rates were approx 11 -14%. and you wern't allowed to shop around for insurance. wages were poor and taxes were high. bloody high. cu and mrs cu can't make up mind whether to renovate or move. cost of renovation( new kitchen, appliances, new floors, new on-suite, new bathroom) quite costly. so started looking around about 6 months ago. on every occasion I have contacted the EA selling the property ( approx 4 ) I have been informed that it has 'just been sold' and in two cases it was 'that morning' The latest is weird because I pass this house on my way to work daily and after I made the enquiry and was informed it was sold the 'for sale' sign went up. its still up but I am not ringing back. Dont trust an EA who would do that. Better luck next time petal.
 
Thanks guys for your kind words... I'm still a bit upset about it...but i suppose one just has to move on. And Cuchulainn, if you can avoid selling and buying, avoid it. The stress and time investment that comes with it... At some stage I was looking at houses almost every evening and every saturday and I started thinking I have no life left!
if you can upgrade your house do that instead. At least you get exactly what you want and how you want it...
 
Our house was sold before the EA put up the For Sale sign, houses do move very quickly these days.
Buying new is not necessarily stress free.
We bought our first house in 2002 and when it was at roof level, thought it would take about three-five months to complete.
PAid out 90% of the cost and had to wait over a year for it to be ready....
Stress was HUGE as we were paying a mortgage and rent....had to move in with family for a while.
It depends on the builder you are dealing with as some seem to get their act together very quickly but others seem to take ages to complete house.
They take money off as many buyers as possible and start as many houses as possible and are in no rush to finish off the houses when they have 90% of your money as it is more benificial to start new houses and get people started on their stage payments.
I have found through buying and selling five houses that there is no easy way to do it.
When it is a home you are buying the stress is even greater.
 
Petal, I'd echo what other posters have said - I feel v. sorry for you. I know it will be difficult, but the only thing to do is to be positive, get back on the horse, and keep going.

There are many, many houses of the type you're looking at in and around D.12 and similar areas - you'll get the right one eventually. This disappointment will only make your eventual success all the sweeter. Once you're happily in situ in your new home, you'll look back on this time and laugh...
 
Thanks, that's very nice of you Sherman, we're half contemplating to maybe look out a bit further and pay less or dig deeper and pay more... Was kind of thinking if we bought a 2 bed and added a double extension eventually, it would cost probably a good 40K, so if you added that 40K now, we could maybe go for a 3 bed and save all the hassle in the future. Although the extra 40K would be a massive step.... Any thoughts on that anyone?
 

Is that 40K based on anything tangible ? We're looking to get building work done and IMHO there is little you could get done for 40K in this country.
 
TarfHead said:
Is that 40K based on anything tangible ? We're looking to get building work done and IMHO there is little you could get done for 40K in this country.
Click to expand...

No sorry, it's just a ballpark figure, I don't really know much about building costs, but we have some friends that would probably do it for us cheaper and I always thought that an extension to the rear is about 20-30K, but maybe I'm totally off the mark... What you're saying would support my reasonings to go for something bigger so...
 
I don't want to rain on your parade but we're getting quotes for work at the moment that don't involve extending the footprint of the house (i.e. no foundations to be dug, no walls to be built, no roof to be made) and all of them are coming in over 65K.

That was my basis for questioning your figure of 40K though I admit we're not comparing like with like.
 

My work colleague had an extension built onto his house last year I think and he reckons the whole building plastering wiring and plumbing and roof came to about 20K. He said it's better to get have every stage done by different people as one builder will charge way more to do it all in one go. So that's where I got this figure from...

But either way, I think one also needs to take all the hassle of having builders in the house into account... I think I'm slowly starting to convince myself that a bigger house from the start would be a better idea alltogether...
 
40k seems low. Built an extension in 1989 and it cost over £30,000 back then. Good luck in with ever you do decide.
 
For what it's worth my neighbours spent €15-20K on converting a small attic into a bedroom plus en-suite and even did most of the finishing themselves. The builders gave us an estimate of €17K for ours.
 
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