The nervous wait to exchange....
- Thread starter noj
- Start date
Currently gearing up to head back to the UK to list the house. Virtually no idea where to price it as there's nothing similar nearby. Had been expecting to aim for our 2018 purchase price + ~15% but unsure if that's realistic or not. We've done some improvements so not purely expected growth. At the peak we were thinking around 340k or so, but now thinking advertise around 320k and see what happens.
We have however made the big mistake which we said we 100% weren't doing, and viewed a house over here in Spain. For 3 months we've said we wouldn't do it as we're not in a position to move out here yet. However we were exploring a new area, had seen a house advert and tried to get the address just to check out the general location. The keyholder lived round the corner and said they could show us around within 5 minutes.
I loved it, the wife has a few hesitations, mainly around the 4/5 bedroom cave house at the edge of the property which needs renovating. I'd love the project, she's less optimistic and it's obviously priced in. The main house itself is ideal and everything we wanted in a house. The cave house is also far enough away that you wouldn't know about it from the main house, so not like it'd be an eyesore whilst it's being renovated.
Currently scrambling to see whether we could get a Spanish mortgage even before we sold our current house. Would be a big risk and financially make things difficult for a few months, but it'd be worth it in the long run.
We have however made the big mistake which we said we 100% weren't doing, and viewed a house over here in Spain. For 3 months we've said we wouldn't do it as we're not in a position to move out here yet. However we were exploring a new area, had seen a house advert and tried to get the address just to check out the general location. The keyholder lived round the corner and said they could show us around within 5 minutes.
I loved it, the wife has a few hesitations, mainly around the 4/5 bedroom cave house at the edge of the property which needs renovating. I'd love the project, she's less optimistic and it's obviously priced in. The main house itself is ideal and everything we wanted in a house. The cave house is also far enough away that you wouldn't know about it from the main house, so not like it'd be an eyesore whilst it's being renovated.
Currently scrambling to see whether we could get a Spanish mortgage even before we sold our current house. Would be a big risk and financially make things difficult for a few months, but it'd be worth it in the long run.
Didn't take long to hit a hurdle. There's a big pylon behind the house (sellers accepted) which aesthetically isn't great but something we could live with. However, upon further investigation, the significance of resell value could be noticeable. And our surveyor has suggested we get an EMF specialist, but also the resale value could trump any positive result from an EMF reading. And we've just found out a very similar house sold two months ago for £50k less, could it be pylon related? Waiting to see what the estate agent says regarding any previous reports being done. We haven't made any financial commitments yet so still easy enough to pull out.
I sometimes do EMF surveys for work, from my experience going out to sites and testing it around my own house anything further away than about 5m won't make a blind bit of difference. I recently did a survey of power lines, on a pylon, which was directly above my head (I was 5.3m directly under it to the wires) and it didn't even register higher than background levels. I made the assumption that the cables were shielded, and I'm sure in the UK all pylons would also be shielded.
The generally acceptable limit is 1.26µT, under the power lines I never got above 0.034µT.
The highest reading I've ever got was my cheap internal door bell chime ironically which is next to the front door, which measured 15.61µT right next to it.
Always makes me smile when we do an EMF survey for new solar farms as the locals somehow believe it's going to slowly kill them, and walking round the area they live in the readings are always much higher.
dlockers
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dlockers
How much is the house? £50k is a rounding error here (timing/right person/context/time). How close is the pylon? It'd certainly make it a buyers market.
Any experience with concrete sub stations? Ever have an occasion where readings have been "high" or impact resale?
£600k, in SW London. The pylon looks about 15-20m behind the garden.
dlockers
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dlockers
Yeah I wouldn't be happy about that TBH; and £50k is quite the leap on a £600k house.
Well a fun afternoon yesterday of chatting to multiple mortgage brokers. Seems it's likely we can get a mortgage, but anything over €330k is definitely out of the question at this stage i think. Due to being Non Fiscal residents (at the moment), the max we can get is 70% LTV, then there's ~13% on top for buying fees. That would require us finding €140k up front and whilst it wouldn't be an issue once our house was sold and completed. We're no-where near completion so would require every penny of savings and then borrowing a significant amount from both our parents. Luckily they both seem willing on account of it being short term. It would also only be needed at time of completion, so in theory we would have sold our house by then and only be waiting a month or two.
The main spanner is that i've heard they received an offer from a guy in the UAE yesterday at a higher amount that we'd be willing to go, however they couldn't complete until early in 2024, and i there's a risk here of leaving a property with very expensive furniture/fittings alone in the countryside for 6 months. It would be easy to break into/potentially attract squatters which are difficult to get rid of. So possibly a lower offer from us would be accepted. I was fairly clear that i wouldn't be in a position to match it.
Since no-one here is likely to gazump me, i figure the risk is low to share the links!
For reference here's the house
Although this one has better pictures of the cave house dwelling
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I'll let you know in a few months
Generally though i think it's fairly similar as far as a process. You find a house you like, sort out a mortgage, get the house valued, then leave it to solicitors to do various land registry searches etc before completion.
The main differences are
1 - A lot of agents are scummy. Seems like they're still of the old style reputation here, whereas England seems a lot more open about things now due to Zoopla/Rightmove
2 - Annoyingly hardly any agents share the location of a house until the viewing. There's no "view on map" and getting the exact location. This is very annoying because sometimes you're looking in a specific area and so can waste time. This is generally accepted as being due to point 1 where they're fearful other agents will try and steal their properties. High demand and low supply seems to have caused this.
3 - You can sometimes be talked into paying a "de-listing" fee. This can be about €3k and simply means the agent takes the advert down to stop others gazumping you. May or may not actually happen, especially if listed with multiple agents
4 - You then pay a deposit of €10k. If you pull out you lose this, if the seller pulls out you get it back, and i think they have to pay a further €10k.
5 - Houses are often fully furnished. This is due to them being second homes, so people just go home, decide to sell and never return. Everything shown in the advert above is included. My parents bought a place and it had food in the cupboards and about 30 bottles of wine, suitcases and tools etc in the cupboards. Their parents have just bought a place which had a ~20yr old Mercedes in the garage.
Mortgages are also 20yrs in the past and generally need a Broker who charge up to 1.5%, although this seems to be changing with more places allowing direct access. The difference here being you get discounts on your mortgages the more products you have. This can knock around 1% off, assuming you pay your salary in, take out insurance products etc. Fixes seem to be for the life of the mortgage, for example i'm looking at a 25yr fix of 3.75%. Variable rates don't seem to be available for Non Residents. Remortgaging also seems pretty rare here.
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Out of interest, who have people been using as Estate Agents? I went with a local branch last time i sold a house as it wasn't high value and the costs weren't similar, but this one is going to make the usual fee structure much more expensive.
I saw Strike that was completely free and then just tried to upsell conveyancing etc to make their money. Guessing you do your own photos etc
I saw Strike that was completely free and then just tried to upsell conveyancing etc to make their money. Guessing you do your own photos etc
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dlockers
D
dlockers
Giving the relative complexity of what you have going on, I'd try and stick to a local "proper agent". Ours did a decent job in ensuring our buyer didn't back out.....critical to us securing a house in a chain.
Yeah that's a decent point. I'm kind of thinking the chain side isn't an issue though as other than repaying family for any loans, we wouldn't *need* the funds so if someone dropped out and it set back a few months it wouldn't be disastrous.
I guess the main advantage is a local agent could act as key holder if we come to Spain prior to the sale completing. Unsure how that'd happen with an online seller.
I've been doing a fair bit of reading/research into this too.I'll let you know in a few months
Generally though i think it's fairly similar as far as a process. You find a house you like, sort out a mortgage, get the house valued, then leave it to solicitors to do various land registry searches etc before completion.
The main differences are
1 - A lot of agents are scummy. Seems like they're still of the old style reputation here, whereas England seems a lot more open about things now due to Zoopla/Rightmove
2 - Annoyingly hardly any agents share the location of a house until the viewing. There's no "view on map" and getting the exact location. This is very annoying because sometimes you're looking in a specific area and so can waste time. This is generally accepted as being due to point 1 where they're fearful other agents will try and steal their properties. High demand and low supply seems to have caused this.
3 - You can sometimes be talked into paying a "de-listing" fee. This can be about €3k and simply means the agent takes the advert down to stop others gazumping you. May or may not actually happen, especially if listed with multiple agents
4 - You then pay a deposit of €10k. If you pull out you lose this, if the seller pulls out you get it back, and i think they have to pay a further €10k.
5 - Houses are often fully furnished. This is due to them being second homes, so people just go home, decide to sell and never return. Everything shown in the advert above is included. My parents bought a place and it had food in the cupboards and about 30 bottles of wine, suitcases and tools etc in the cupboards. Their parents have just bought a place which had a ~20yr old Mercedes in the garage.
Mortgages are also 20yrs in the past and generally need a Broker who charge up to 1.5%, although this seems to be changing with more places allowing direct access. The difference here being you get discounts on your mortgages the more products you have. This can knock around 1% off, assuming you pay your salary in, take out insurance products etc. Fixes seem to be for the life of the mortgage, for example i'm looking at a 25yr fix of 3.75%. Variable rates don't seem to be available for Non Residents. Remortgaging also seems pretty rare here.
Some Debts relating to the house apparently stay with the house, not the person who incurred the debt. Your agent needs to ensure things are clear.
It also seems that the agent/solicitor can actually work for both parties (and often try to in an effort to increase fees) although it's not mandatory.
edit: just saw the link to the property you're looking at. Absolutely lovely. If I could find somewhere like that a bit further North I'd be delighted.
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I've done some more research. Found 4 other properties near the one we're trying to buy so should have the pylon in view. These 4 (often smaller but similarish) were much more in line, in the £580-600k range.
dlockers
D
dlockers
If you love the house then do it!
You're right and we do love the house, it has a lot of positives and in London - there is usually a bigger compromise. I think, as first time buyers, it can be a little overwhelming but we're back down to Earth now and feeling a lot better
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Soldato
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- 18 Oct 2002
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- Aranyaprathet, Thailand
Have accepted an offer on my house. Not buying anywhere and the buyer isn't selling anything so hopefully it will go through easily. Very nervous and feeling like I'm tempting fate to even think about it.