Houses for sale

[Kaz]

Nice house Di but as you say probably a bit pricey - once you go over that stamp duty threshold it gets trickier Prices your way seem to be similar to where we lived before, Egham in Surrey. You don't get much there for a quarter of a mill We paid 20k more for our tiny three bed Victorian cottage in 2007 than we did for the lovely big modern house we have now

Jo that house would cost pretty much that around here, you can easily get a 3 bed semi for under £150k here in Gloucester................

[Kaz]

I think we got a bargain for this one though at £226k................There is one round the corner similar design to ours but 5 beds and extra shower room, on for £345k (they are asking far too much, it's been on the market since we moved in) and a two storey 4 bed down the road on at £289k

A nice 4 bed in the next cul de sac was on for £280k (integral garage design) and that has just completed but I don't know if they got FAP, I'll have to wait until their stats go onto Rightmove to see what it actually went for

We have the nicest view on the whole estate as well, over the playing field - most of the houses here just face other houses

[saundra]

love looking at all these houses (dead nosey)
they look great so tidy and smart
weka after all your hard work its lovely
dif love your neighbours kitchen /laundry room
jo good look with your MIL move

[Diflower]

Of course they look smart and tidy Saundra, they're trying to sell them

Mind you, I have been to houses/flats for sale that the people had made no effort with whatsoever!

[JoM]

I think we got a bargain too, at just under £195,000, our neighbours have the identical house and paid £225,000 just 5 months earlier and two houses around the corner which are in a terrace of three and are substantiably smaller than ours both sold for £195,000 three months ago.

We were prepared to buy ours at £210,000 but Nationwide made an error on the mortgage and said we couldn't have the amount we needed. We found this out after a phone call on the Friday evening so visited the sales office here first thing on the Saturday and said that we could only proceed with the sale if they reduced the price by £5,000.
On Monday I called Nationwide, the first chance we had to talk to management, to query why they wouldn't give us the amount we needed because we fell well within the guidelines for getting the mortgage we needed. The lady I spoke to immediately said she could see that there was an error and would look into it and get back to me. She did shortly afterwards and said that there was no problem with us getting the mortgage we required and she was rectifying the paperwork to reflect that.

Soon after that conversation the sales advisor from the builders called to say that they wouldn't knock £5,000 off the price...no, they were going to knock £15,000 off instead but could we complete by the end of January instead of the first week in February.
In the space of 24 days we managed to pull off the signing of the agreement to buy, action a solicitor, arrange the mortgage, pack, exchange, complete and move in.

[Diflower]

Oh gosh yes Jo I remember all that drama, but you did do well out of it didn't you
We did well too, but it was a bit hairy. This one was originally on for £225,000, and when we saw it had been reduced to £215,000. We found out that the people selling had put a deposit on a brand new place and it was almost finished, so Bb got brave and offered £205,000 and we got it for £208,000.
The other one we looked at here had already had double glazing and the kitchen done and was £225,000, but it didn't cost us the difference to get them done
In the meantime though the sale of his flat fell through, in the end the landlord bought it (he'd wanted it all along but didn't have the dosh) but it kept getting delayed, he even didn't complete on time so we had to cancel removals etc, and had the phone already cut off
Got there in the end though - seven years ago on Wednesday it was
Rightmove and others are great aren't they Kaz

[Kaz]

Oh you both got great deals too!

Jo I remember that well - so dramatic!

Di I love Rightmove

[miasmum]

At least you didn't have time to worry Jo

We had the opposite. This house went on the market in July 1988 when the lady moved into a home. It was a ramshackle, leaking, wreak. A property developer bought it for £56000 and within a week put it on the market at £85000 with a proviso they would arrange for it to be done up, new bathroom, new kitchen, the buyer could choose. At the time houses on this estate were going up by £1000 a week and so having fallen in love with the garden and believing the cowboy, we agreed to proceed. We sold our lovely house really quickly to a horrible man, who hassled us every step of the way.

As it got nearer and nearer to completion nothing had been done on our house, we were being hassled to complete by our buyer and houses we liked were now way way out of our price range, they were going for well over £100,000 (sounds mad now).

Our solicitor kept saying hold on, hold on, but we couldn't so we asked for a reduction. He reduced the price by £2000 the day before we were supposed to exchange. We had no choice, we were packed, so we agreed and exchanged at £83,000 on a house that wasn't fit to live in. A fortnight later the property developer went to prison for mortgage fraud

We had to live with our brother and sister in law for 6 weeks, and they only moved in their house 2 weeks before and it took years of blood sweat and toil and a lot of money to sort this house out.

How I hate property developers

[Kaz]

[Diflower]

Blimey MM, that brings me out in a cold sweat just reading about it