On Thu, 14 Oct 2004 11:20:26 +0100, "Al Reynolds"
wrote:

"MM" wrote:

chris French wrote:
sounds believable, according to SB on Property Ladder tonight ,
nationwide, average selling price is 94% of the asking price.

Which would put my property firmly in the £190K ballpark, not £185K.
Also, the poperty has already been reduced in price twice. I am not in
the business of giving it away. If people come and view a property on
at £199,950, then they do, in my view, need to have a pretty good idea
beforehand what they can actually afford. I could view houses at
£300K, believing that "somehow" I would be able to find the cash. One
has to be realistic. If they don't bite, someone else will. My niece
took 15 months to sell her property in a different part of the country

Then "David" wrote:
We could talk about market prices, inflation during the time you have been
on the market and all that crap

Indeed.

In the end, the market value of a property is exactly what the
highest bidder is prepared to offer at any particular time. At the
moment, the market value of your property appears to be £185k.

Look at it this way: Currently you are being offered £185k.
Let's say it does take 15 months to sell your property at £200k.
This is equivalent to a price rise of 1.6% per quarter, or 6.4%
per year. You might well be pleased with the extra £15k you
have managed to squeeze out of a buyer, but if the house prices
in the area you are looking at go up by more than 8% in those
fifteen months you're just screwing yourself.

You have to make the call on whether you accept the offer, but
just be aware that if you still haven't sold in six months time you
may regret it - especially if prices are rising in the area you want
to move to.

If anything, the prices are firming up again in my area, but still
falling (somewhat) in my target location. I thought along these lines,
too, and did a quick survey on RightMove of local prices. If anything,
my property is now *under*valued by several percentage points. The
closest to my property locally, pricewise, is a 2-bed terrace on a
very busy main road, or rather ugly flats. Everything else is *at
least* 40K higher because they are not ex-LA properties. If I take my
property off the market over the winter, ten to one I shall be able to
command a higher price come the spring, especially if the MPC doesn't
play silly buggers with the interest rate, which is unlikely in the
run-up to the May election. In fact, I just bought a box of daffodil
bulbs from Tesco and planted them in time for spring! Either I or the
new owner will be greeted by a host of golden daffs to make Wordsworth
proud.

MM