"My name is comfortablynumb and I am an alcoh...., sorry, potential House Seller".
Hi to you all. I have been reading the forum posts avidly each day for a few months and have finally decided to ask for some opinions about a house sale. Now I obviously know prices are bombing and now is not the time to buy etc etc but what I was looking for was an opinion on the topic title.
A little bit of detail about my situation. I have a standard 3 bed semi in Bangor which is equipped with the same sort of cack as all the other 3 bed semis around the place. I bought in Sep 01 for £74K which to me was a fortune back then (and still is!). There are currently no fewer than 6 semis in my particular estate up for sale with 5 different EA's ranging in price from £185k - £220k (ha-ha). The rateable value of most of these gaffs would be £100k with the couple that have garages deserving a bit more. If I was to put the house on the market at £149k, do you think there would be any interest or would it just be flogging a dead horse? Would any EA take instruction at that price or would I be causing my own local mini crash in their eyes?
I would like to sell at whatever is a fair price so let's have your opinions to see what I could expect. I intend to get out of house ownership and all the associated s h 1 t to lead a more relaxed life with my wife in our caravan (not MEW'd) for 9 months of the year and possibly a rental for the other 3 months.
Thanks for reading and fire away. I've thick skin.

if your happy with 149k
stick a for sale sign up with the price on it and a wee add in the local rag
and see what happens
be prepared will almost certainly p1ss off some your neighbours !

rock on!

I put a house up for sale last year and, when it was clear to me that the significant correction was starting, I sought to decrease the price .... I found that there was much reluctance from my EA to do this (and other EAs expressed similar sentiments), but I would like to think there is a bit more realism one year on.



The only other thing I'd say from my own perspective is that, no matter what price you put your house up for, be prepared to accept a lower price. I know that everything is relative (and its a well known tactic to splash an artifically high price on houses), but no matter what a house is priced at, I would be looking for a significant discount from the asking price - its very much a buyer's market out there.

Don't waste your time. I don't think it matters what price you put on a property in todays market, no matter what the price is folks will say its to dear. I would wait and see what next year brings.

If you don't know what to do, do nothing.

Hmm to counter that if you dont try you will never know!
You are still at a discount to your neighbours, but if you wait till next year £149k could be dear compared to neighbours!
There has been a few sold my end of the woods when people have came down 40-50k from 200k

Yes id be suprised if eas refused your instruction to go in at that price. I think they need people to reduce prices but persuading them is another matter!
no sale = no income = the chop!

Err... I wouldn't do nothing in a falling market.

It's all a bit of a game but as people like a bargain why not put it on at £180k but tell the EA you'd take signfiicantly less. That way he'll point people to your house as the most likely sale (=commission).

Pricing it at a headline £149k when the others are much higher suggests there may be something wrong with it, even though there isn't.

When the price of a repayment mortgage per month is similar to the rent you would pay per month, prices have reached something of a sensible level.

For example, I know someone who is renting a 3 bedroom terrace house in East Belfast for £430 a month. £430 would pay off a mortgage of £60,000*. I see a house the same as the one he is renting is currently on the market for £170k - the rateable value is £75K.

This gives you an idea of how much things have to fall.

*100% repayment @ 7% over 25 years

Don't worry about EAs not wanting it... they are desperate for commission so they want sellers like you! Not the silly ones who won't reduce their prices.

I say go for it, be prepared to accept an offer under the asking and keep us posted.

I'd do the same, I think it's worth a try

The current rental yield matches an IO mortgage similar to the RV value of £75k. [430 x 12]/0.07 = 74,000. I know there's maintenance etc and rates etc.

However who has the most skewed rent compared to house price, on this site. To kick off - mines is a 2600 sq feet, unfurnished house that is less than ten years old with beautiful river at the back fence with plenty trout etc. It can't flood either as the far bank is eight feet lower. Priced at £289,000 versus rent of £485 p.c.m. Nine houses in a gated community with 2 acre green at front. Rent paid through agency. He's happy as he expects capital appreciation to return soon. But then again he's really sound. Happy days.

Nearly 50 times rent = house price. My own build will be another number of months but in no hurry. Anyone with less than 2% yield.

if he is happy why is he selling?
if he thinks capital appreciation to return soon why sell?

rock on!

I agree with Rock-n-Roll, I wouldn't bother trying to sell now, unless you are under severe financial pressures to do so.

The successful salesman goes to the market to sell his wares, the market doesn't come to the salesman. Today the market is closed until further notice, so the salesman should take a break.

According to Property News, in Bangor there are 149 houses priced between £100k and £150k, only 14 of these are sale agreed and as you will have seen sale agreed does not mean sold, so i would put that at a more realistic figure of 149 on the market and only 5 to 10 likely to actually change hands.

You bought at the right time for a price which means that even in today's market you've made considerable money on the equity of your property, as for how much who can say because you won't know until you sell, and to sell you need buyers, buyers who are boycotting the housing maket for the forseeable.

To sell at £150k, your home will have to beat off competition from potentially more than the 149 advertised in that price bracket, higher priced homes and homes outside Bangor will also compete with your home on the market, and with only a handful of buyers around, your house would need to be some pup indeed to secure a sale.

Let other people bail out if they want to/need to but be patient. You will have to wait for the market to change and one of the greatest changes that can happen is for properties which haven't sold to be withdrawn from the market. The new energy performance rating requirement will see to this sooner or later. A short supply makes selling a lot easiier than an oversupply.

2008 will be a washout for selling to go down in history, putting property on the market now is as daft as trying to sell booze in a mosque - nobody wants to buy it so don't waste your time.

Hi comfortablynumb and welcome. There are lots of views regarding your situation and all are valid - the truth will be somewhere in the middle of it all.

For what it's worth you might want to check out the auction data in the various spreadsheets on http://nipropertyauctions.googlepages.com/. If you can find some Bangor based properties in the spreadsheets then that should at least give you an idea as to what the auction punter (private individual, BTL'er or investor) is prepared to part with in the current market conditions and you will at least see the actual value of the transaction/sale as that is all recorded in the datasets. Remember though that the auction beast is a very different one from that of EA's and you can't really compare like with like.

You'll also see properties which didn't achieve sales and the lack of bidding for some properties. That should be helpful too as it will give you a snapshot of the auction market over time (I started collating this data in Feb '08 and the data runs right up to June '08).

In any event you might find it interesting and a reality check to attend an auction. FTR the next Wilson's Auction is Wednesday 30th July 2008 @ 7.30pm in Portadown and the next Wilson's Mallusk auction is in early September 2008 (as they take a break for summer hols).

Hi CN,

I was in a similar situation to yourself at the start of the year - coming off the property market.
I sold my house in May'08.....I put it on alot less than similar houses in my area and it was sale agreed within a week.

My Estate Agent said someone would be getting a bargain........... the more expensive similar houses in my estate have now been reduced well below what I got for mine and still on the market..... so you just tell your agent what price YOU want to sell at!

If I were you I'd cut my losses and run, put it on for lower than the others and if it doesnt get any interest in a couple of weeks reduce it again - someone will eventually bite, there is always people who need to move etc..... and there is still a bit of money around from the boom for one reason or another.

I wish you all the best.

For those who say that nothing will sell now regardless of the price..... Where I see big reductions,I'm seeing 'sale agreed' and 'sold'.

I'd take a punt at 149k but be prepared to go as low as maybe 145k

if you don't have to sell I wouldn't - imo

http://www.propertynews.com/brochure.php?r...mp;p=GOCGOC3764
3 bed semi bt9 - £240k
rates value - £185k

I would probably bite at rates value which this property is only about a 20% drop away from.
I suspect we will go lower than that even.

I suspect many like me see rates value as the MOST they will pay just now.

When prices drop by 50% nominal from peak. Then I'll review the situation.

I think rate value is a good guide - some properties will even in the current market be worth slightly more than the rate value but these will be the ones that the area has improve since 2005 - or have luckily become more desirable because of good local schools or improved commuter routes.

GetDoom - the houes in BT9 is quite interesting, I love the comment 'In need of slight modernisation' and then no internal pictures. But I agree provided it is Slight Modernisation, I too would be interest at the rates value.

Not that I'm trying to start a bidding War!!! (those days are over) but there are buyers out there the price is the problem with houses not selling !!!

I would also urge caution with this particular property...

Yes it is BT9... but I wouldn't class it as the 'proper' BT9 if that makes sense?

Wellesley Avenue is a prime student location... just round the corner from the Bot (how convenient - it's a mere 2 minute commute! ).

Expect your neighbours to have crazy parties at all hours of the morning and don't grow too attached to your wheelie bin... I seem to recall Wellesley Avenue being a favourite location for wheelie bin races!

Now that I think of it... could this possibly be the house that I walked past at 5am whilst finishing my final year dissertation? I can still see the people literally hanging out of the windows and the pounding music vibrating across the street...

being a tender 25 , this sounds like my kind of street ;-)

Then this could very well be the property of your dreams! Just think about it... no need for taxis or transport... come weekends you can just stumble from bar to bar!

What are you waiting for - buy buy buy!

rateable value

Looks like a distressed seller has beaten me to it
Undercutting by £25k is some slap in the face for the rest of them.

http://www.propertynews.com/results.php?s=50054806

This is happenin all over...

Look at this street in belfast... £60k difference between highest and lowest priced.

These are 2 bed terraced!!

Walmer st bt7

I'm after a 3-bed semi with a bit of a garden and a garage and would definitely bite if I could get one in a nice area of Belfast for 150k.

It might sound like that would require a large fall given that 2up/2down terraces in so-so areas were 200k at the height of the madness last summer but I reckon that's quite a reasonable price to pay given local wages and looking at historical prices, not just the last 5-6 years.

Whoa - nice illustration of the madness of prices! They are all grossly overpriced. But almost 200k for a 2 bed terrace in this market? They're having a laugh surely

I looked at a few properties around there in late 2006 - typical price was in the £150-175k. Unless the people in them are 'flippers' or have remortaged, they can afford a significant drop yet before they should see any trouble - only greed stands in their way.

I have had a quick scan on property news to see how all stands. My target 'type' of property has always been a smallish 2/3 bed semi, with a garage (car needs care!) and in a reasonable area. I still see most of the appropriate propetry in east befast/holywood/helensbay direction as being £200k. Assuming someone will lend me a 4x multiple and including my deposit, these properties need to fall by a good 30% before I can bite. I am still getting people telling me that I should be looking at a cheap apartment as a first step - these people annoy the life out of me! Everyone should start at the bottom - it does not matter that I earn (relatively) twice as much as they did when they started, I should still start in the same property. Madness.

Depends on cirumstances, kids, age i guess. Lol alot of 2-3 bedroom aparments in Belfast are dearer than houses slighly further out!

If you consider that Glengormley is a nice area of Belfast (debatable I know), you should be spoilt for choice at the minute.

Here's a cheapie, only two minutes from the motorway:


http://www.propertynews.com/brochure.php?r...1195HF859178120

Were only the same so easily available at the other side of the town!

http://www.ulsterpropertysales.co.uk/prope...c.aspx?ID=27839


I wonder if you put in a realistic offer - <175k, would they still honour the £1000 holiday voucher / solicitor, stamp duty fees etc ??

The price of something like this will drop another £30K at least before this crash is over IMHO.

Still, one of the better-value homes I've seen on sale lately.

http://www.propertynews.com/brochure.php?r...amp;p=PNC336540

Can I ask you guys your honest opinion on this one? What sort of offer could you make on this?

and this...

http://www.propertynews.com/brochure.php?r...amp;p=PNC403431

It has come down £35k already from £195k to £160k. If they knock another £35k off it might be a go'er - so £125k IMHO.

and even at that a FTB couple would probably need a combined income of close to £40k to make repayments affordable/bearable.

The view from the EA that I spoke to yesterday (McAfee's in Coleraine) is that housing prices now simply have to re-adjust to what people can afford


But then again some might say "They would say that wouldn't they"

£100K-ish. Rateable value is probably about £90K.

I personally wouldn't buy that house for £100K, but if you could get it for that and wanted the security of owning a house now, then you could probably do alot worse.

Another EA saying the same thing but coyly not mentioning a price
http://www.propertynews.com/brochure.php?r...amp;p=PNC368504
Quote

In the present economic climate it is a fact that the housing market is now experiencing a return to reality.The qualities that made a house attractive were always more than just price and now we have returned to fundamentals once again. quote

Cheers - thats exactly the capital valuation in '05 which seems about right. Wasn't the capital valuation carried our at the beginning of 05? I seem to remember that it was quite conservative in many ways. Did they err on the side of caution when valuing properties or where they overtaken by events in the housing market?

From my reading of the situation many people objected to their valuation on the basis that the valuations were too high - how this equates to the subsequent rush to say their houses were under valued for selling beats me.

I think the area is OK. if i thought I could get it for 145 I'd seriously think about it. It would stetch me financially though, even though I have quite a big deposit.

Nice semi detached houses in East Belfast (dare I say nicer than that one) can be rented for £600 a month.

A £125K mortgage @ 6.5% over 25 years would be £850 a month.

IMHO £125K is still too much.

Yeah. I know quite alot of folk who queried the valuation too. Im just think of my parents house which was actually valued pretty low - certinly well below what you could have got on the open market at that time. I just wondered whether this was the norm.

I suppose what Im asking is does the 05 capital valuation actualy reflect valuations in mid to late '04?

I live close to here. One of my best friends lives in Orangefield so I know the area; it's a nice area and I wouldn't mind living there at all.

Not sure about the Capital Valuation side of things HPCwhen. Sorry 'bout that. There will be others reading this though that will know more than me and can advise - I only returned to NI in Summer '05 after 15 years away and only discovered the NI HPC website 9 months ago.

When I say OK I mean I could certinly live there - I like it. I might go and view this property. What do you guys think would be a cheeky (but not insulting) offer.

If you really want to buy now, and are happy to pay £145K then go ahead and offer that - I think they'll probably accept.

That is if you can get that rate of interest. Anything more than 85% LTV and you will be paying between 6.65% and if you borrow 90-95% then you could be paying 7.44% per month. IT seems 6.15% is for 75%LTV.

The other point to consider is rates tax, heating bills, water bills, electric bills, car tax, car running costs, broadband monthly, telephone (mobile and landline), food bills, nights out etc etc. Also this could add up to a hefty monthly outgoing. Ideally, you want to be able to save money each month or invest it rather than living on the edge for 10-25 years.

Tell me about it. I'm under no illusions that it'll mean tightening my belt. A house is a big liability. If I bought at 145 it would be with a LTV of approximately 70%. I'm assuming (maybe I'm wrong) that this would insulate me (and my bank) from negative equity if I was, for whatever reaon, forced to sell within the next 5-10 years)

I don't really care if the person feels insulted. I offer what I can afford and what I think it's worth. i.e can I live with the decision 25 years from now if interest rates ever go up to 12%. Tell me that's impossible! I don't want to be caught short and lose what I have invested in.

I viewed 2 houses with the intention of making a very low offer, I went in asked what they were willing to accept (this will still be higher than they will take), they made it clear they weren't going to go for anything like what i wanted to pay, I left. No hard feelings.

I KNOW there is not a shortage of houses like the ones I like, i.e 4 walls and a roof in a decent area. I'd like a garage or room for one, 2 or 3 bedrooms. I know more are coming on to the market than are going off. I know we are in a falling market which looks to be going to fall for another 1 year at least! All that considered and knowing what rate they are falling at I would wait if I can or offer what I can now and see if they bite. If they drop more could you cope with that, and if you are worried about a drop then that's probably because you believe there will be one.

Noone on here can really advise you, just say what they would do.

Yeah, I appeciate this. Its good to hear the way others are thinking.