Guidance on how to ask landlord if they want to sell us the house we're renting

javiercarrillo

Registered User
Messages
7
Hi everyone - as title says, my partner and I have been looking at properties but also would like to ask our landlord if they would be interested in selling the house we're renting from them.

Although we have the contact details of the landlord, we have never met or had direct communication with the them. Everything has always been through a property management agency.

As such, I am not sure if there is a "standard" procedure or "etiquette" to follow. Should I just contact the landlord directly? (but that may come across as odd?) or inform the property management that we would like them to ask the landlord (but not sure if they would since that might not be in their scope or interest).

Thanks,
Javier
 
Curious to know how would the parties come to a realistic selling price? Inependent valuation, or average of a number of valuations?
 
Curious to know how would the parties come to a realistic selling price? Inependent valuation, or average of a number of valuations?

Eh, why would they do that?

Someone owns something and someone else wants to buy it. Just make them an offer.

I would keep a million miles away from the agent.
 
Yes, they could waste each other time on that score.

The buyer will want to pay as little as realistically possible to buy the property. And why wouldn't they
The seller will want as much as they realistically can for their property. And why wouldn't they.

So as they are not a million miles away from their goal, there should be an average focal point on the value to start with. Then they can each play with the figures to suit, ie, no agent involved, no advertising, clean sale etc..
 
As LS400 states, one good point in the buyers favour and should be leveraged is the fact thast the landlord does not have to pay estate agent fees which can be anything from 1 to 2% plus extras.
 
It’s a pretty high hurdle though to not go through a former sales process. i.e. it’s hard to see a low-ball offer being successful and 1-1.5% saved might pale versus getting a potentially competitive sales process going. The onus is usually on the person looking to disrupt the status quo to make a deal happen, i.e. it’d be pretty cheeky to reach out in this way and then try to low-ball. For example, if I’m the tenant and it’s an estate where houses go for €450k, my offer would be €450k (or maybe €445k to account for the fees).

But we don’t even know whether the owner wants to sell.

As a starter, I’d simply reach out to the owner directly and just ask “would you be interested in selling?”. Getting the agent involved just complicates things unnecessarily and they’re conflicted (i.e. don’t want to lose management fees and would want to dip their beak into any transaction).
 
Back
Top