Sales negotiating – getting the best property at the right price

You love the property and you really want it, but you’re concerned you’re paying too much or you’ve got some serious worries and don’t want to confront the seller.

You’re making the biggest investment of your life based on two or three 20-minute viewings. Unless you’re a property expert, chances are you’ll either miss something important that reduces the value of the property, or if you do spot it you’ll be too embarrassed to negotiate with the seller to reduce their price. If only you had someone who could do it for you….

Well that’s where Campbells can help.

One of our experienced associates will visit the property to make an assessment of its condition, research its history and the area, and if necessary even knock on neighbours’ doors for a quiet chat to see if there is anything you need to know about.

For example:

• Is there excessive traffic noise at different times of the day?
• Does anyone in the area have an ASBO?
• Are there development or quarrying plans not yet at planning stage?
• Has there been previous damage caused by flooding or subsidence?
• Have any planning applications been recently applied for?
  

Our experienced associates are trained to spot things other agents would miss or not care enough to alert you about. If any outstanding issues are found we’ll negotiate with the seller to reduce the price accordingly.

Case study Wouldn’t you want to know if the seller had lied about their house being damaged? Well that’s what happened to one buyer recently, who discovered through a YouTube video that the house she had been assured was safe and flood-proof had in fact been subject to a devastating flood a couple of years below that destroyed the bottom floor of the property. Thanks to some clever questions and the Internet, the real truth was revealed and the buyer was able to pull out of the sale before it was too late.

There has never been a property we didn’t manage to reduce the price of and we can do the same for you. Even better, our fee is covered by the amount we save you so you won’t be out of pocket. Give us a call now for more details of our fees and remember: you make your money when you buy a property, not when you sell, so be sure you’re buying wisely.

Case study Campbells were asked to visit a detached property by a purchaser to make an assessment of its condition and highlight any issues that may cause problems in the future. The first thing we spotted was that it wasn’t detached. The buyer hadn’t realised that the property’s attached garage was also joined to the garage of the neighbouring property. This is known as a link-detached property and affects its value. The second problem that was discovered after a chat with the owner was that his next door neighbour had several cars that were frequently manoeuvred on his driveway due to lack of space, effectively making it a ‘shared’ driveway. The buyer wanted to back out of the purchase at this point and lose all the other benefits of that house because he felt unable to conduct the negotiation properly. Our recommendation to the buyer was to proceed with the sale, but Campbells would highlight the issues to the owner and negotiate a price reduction which the buyer felt was appropriate and made him feel happier about continuing with the sale. With our help, the owner agreed to accept the buyer’s request for a reduction of £15,000, and the buyer was satisfied that he’d made the right decision in the end.

**Please note, we cannot offer this service if the property you’re interested in is being sold by Campbells. It would unethical to do so when our seller’s pay us a fee to represent their interests in their property sale.


A quiet word about gazumping...