Currently buying/selling a house? How is it going? READ MOD NOTE POST #1

Thanks Copacetic,

Were you Ulster Bank?

Have been looking in NE (Meath, Louth, Cavan and W/Meath)and have noticed that since May 2023 (WHEN GRANT CAME IN) asking prices went up by 70,000 and quality went down AND anything that goes sale agreed is back on the market within 3 months

Yes, agree/ The ones that I have seen have been way overpriced and have issues including planning and boundry and a good few have been sold as qualifying for grant but have not been vacant for 2 years (which authorities can easily check by electricity usage). For some reason I am finding this alot with estate agents and auctioneers in NE region

Anecdotal I know, but the experience we had after managing to close on our first house last year was 2 houses fall through after sale agreed because of planning/access issues and then we had another house take 9 months getting contracts to us before we called it quits.

Is that law coming in yet for getting the house planning in order before you can put the house on the market? Because it's scandalous what they can get away with putting up for sale now "in case it's a cash buyer" because a mortgage provider would be more thorough

I would imagine you can do another viewing, no problem at all.

You can put the deposit down and change your mind 100 per cent, and get it back. You may find however that the next time you offer with that EA, they'll be less likely to deal with you.

At this time of year, you would generally find people out and about in the evenings. I used to drive/cycle/walk around the area and just start chatting to people I meet to find out what the local vibe is.

Re the neighbours, you could definitely call in, introduce yourself, and have a query about something else totally unrelated in the area (sports clubs, public transport, etc). You'll get a sense of things quick enough.

You may want to check planning applications with local authorities around the area; also check the flood maps, again from the local authorities. They will tell you if the area is prone to flooding.

Also, check the street name on google with the word 'court'; this could let you know about any difficulties locally.

^ This above is why its def worth having chats with neighbours if you can.

House we ended up buying was definitely influenced by one of the nicest families I've ever met being next door. Been a joy to have as neighbours since we moved in

Given the choice id prefer to have 2 good neighbors either side of me than one potential disaster artist, especially the one attached to a semi - d, so we just bailed and left it to whoever was willing to take the chance.

We were running all sorts of scenarios through our heads. Wondering did they man have a grudge. Was he telling the truth. We were only hearing from one neighbor. We only heard one side of the story.

After weighing it all up though we decided that there is more of a chance of something being off on one side or the other here and we were just better off out of it.

Maybe families looking to move while the children are off for the summer?

Can anyone tell me the usual timeline for sequence of events after my offer is accepted by vendor. Do I have to lodge a deposit within a day or two to secure the property, or does it take weeks? I'm currently looking at a property that ticked all the right boxes but as the price has crept up I've been looking at it more and more critically, and realistically the property definitely needs an engineer's report. Along with this, one of the boxes that is no longer ticked is it being cheap, which is also contributing to my cooling off, along with it being in an area not I'm crazy about.

its always been the case. Every EA will tell you that. Houses sell better in Spring/Summer as they look better, brighter weather, longer days, gardens look better, kids off school so moving house easier. Almost any house I bought was in the Summer (I bought 5 )

We had the same problem. Just went straight in at our highest price on the last one on day one and it got accepted. We decided that it would slow be bid up by 20% anyway and we would drag everyone else up bidding slowly and then lose out again.

We went straight in with what we thought the price would eventually be bid up to hoping to scare everyone off on day one and maybe the vendor would bite at such a high amount over asking straight away. We bid and said we wanted sale agreed tomorrow or we were going with another property. It worked.

Last 2 houses I've been bidding on, on the lower scale (360k) have gone for 120k and 70k over asking.

Also remember you must be employable all those 35 years and no drop in income, no health issues in all those 35 years etcccc

And have 150k in savings before hand. And then childcare costs on top of it.

That is cheaper than renting :)

My Dad explained this to me years ago but only in the last month have I really understood it.

He said when you buy your house it will feel very expensive. But 10, 20 years down the line your mortgage will seem cheap. If you keep renting your rent will rise with inflation over the years. Your mortgage will reduce with inflation. When you are retired paying zero or a small mortgage on your house trumps being retired and renting. And as your salary increases then you can pay lumps off of it if you choose. The hard part is starting it off in the first place.

So we recently bought ours on a 35 year mortgage. Then about 3 months later we both got raises totaling about 15% of our combined income. Ive been told bonuses are back this year too, so in the Summer im expecting another 10%. This is all money we didnt think we would have. After tax we should be over €15k better off this year than last year.

So now we suddenly have options. We have to decide do we overpay the mortgage or spend that money. We will probably use most of it to overpay. Maybe get the 35 year mortgage down to about 32 years after just one year. Or we could have our monthly payments reduced.

We are counting on that happening most years from now on too, or we will be changing jobs to better paying ones. Probably be a few lean years in there along the way too, but overall we are expecting the mortgage to get easier as time goes by. And then childcare will probably be another mortgage or two at some point :) But the main thing is to knock out the mortgage early by as much as possible.

When places go sale agreed and fall through they tend to come back on the market at the sale agreed price, not the original asking price. However I was sale agreed on a place in late 2023 at 45k over asking and got absolutely dicked around by the seller, think I posted about it on here. It's just gone back up now with an asking price of 30k over what we had agreed to pay for it, and the sale falling though was 100% the sellers fault and a complete waste of my time and money. They will get that price too, at an absolute minimum I would say. I hate to see people rewarded for that kind of behaviour, arseholes.