Prospective 'letter drop' in area we want to buy
Discussion
Oh it is a real shot in the dark, and I wont be getting my hopes up. So few houses have come up since we started looking 2 months ago that we are just keeping all options open.
Any potential interest i will suggest they get a few valuations and we average them out. I 'argue' the lack of hassle (matter of perspective admittedly) from a chain & us being cash buyers and lack of estate agent fees and they will 'argue' they arnt in a rush to sell the house and have no interest in going below a certain price. If their price is excessive then we walk away, this isn't our last & only option...just an option!
What we also gain is if we get zero interest at all, we can stop getting our hopes up for a house in that particular neighborhood and start realising that we may have to compromise on some of the features we wanted/are hanging on for.
If we get 'x' amount of interest, then we learn that we can afford to hang on for the perfect house as more will be coming to market in the coming months.
It's one avenue whilst we wait for more houses to come to market!
edit; spelling
Any potential interest i will suggest they get a few valuations and we average them out. I 'argue' the lack of hassle (matter of perspective admittedly) from a chain & us being cash buyers and lack of estate agent fees and they will 'argue' they arnt in a rush to sell the house and have no interest in going below a certain price. If their price is excessive then we walk away, this isn't our last & only option...just an option!
What we also gain is if we get zero interest at all, we can stop getting our hopes up for a house in that particular neighborhood and start realising that we may have to compromise on some of the features we wanted/are hanging on for.
If we get 'x' amount of interest, then we learn that we can afford to hang on for the perfect house as more will be coming to market in the coming months.
It's one avenue whilst we wait for more houses to come to market!
edit; spelling
Edited by Andehh on Thursday 28th February 18:44
LordFlathead - any chance you could remove the whole of my first post from your reply?
One of the 'security' bits i had in mind was removing my opening post/the bulk of it when I was going to put the letters through peoples doors. First thing I would do is google a few sentences if I received a letter like this to try and find out more/if it was a scam.
One of the 'security' bits i had in mind was removing my opening post/the bulk of it when I was going to put the letters through peoples doors. First thing I would do is google a few sentences if I received a letter like this to try and find out more/if it was a scam.
Be careful going down that route for agreeing a value as "you" will likely pay a premium. Assuming agents in Banbury are the same as they are in most towns even a wisely selected sample of three agencies are likely to produce an average value 5% or so over the likely OMV - if they are asked by nice Mrs Jones for a "valuation" that is. Unless specifically briefed those agents are likely going to over-value by a little (for all manner of reasons, most of which easily justifiable retrospectively).
Of course, if they are fully briefed as to the reasons for the valuations they are as likely as not to politely decline the offer and forward the vendor to their surveying arms who will visit for a couple of hundred pounds each, make lots of notes then with a bit of algorithmic BS and a long chat with their estate agent partners come up with an entirely fictitious value that we'll never be able to adequately know was fair to one, other or both parties.
Once you two parties have agreed a price neither of you has any real security beyond the average deal. In fact you might have even less security than normal as the vendor hadn't shown specific commitment to the move so is as likely as average to not move when they can't find a house themselves etc. Anyway, that's specific to the individual, I suppose.
Have heart, however. Spring is springing and so more and more potential sellers will start to come out of the woodwork. It always happens and I dare say Banbury is as conservative as most areas so vendors will soon start to emerge for their winter hibernation.
Of course, if they are fully briefed as to the reasons for the valuations they are as likely as not to politely decline the offer and forward the vendor to their surveying arms who will visit for a couple of hundred pounds each, make lots of notes then with a bit of algorithmic BS and a long chat with their estate agent partners come up with an entirely fictitious value that we'll never be able to adequately know was fair to one, other or both parties.
Once you two parties have agreed a price neither of you has any real security beyond the average deal. In fact you might have even less security than normal as the vendor hadn't shown specific commitment to the move so is as likely as average to not move when they can't find a house themselves etc. Anyway, that's specific to the individual, I suppose.
Have heart, however. Spring is springing and so more and more potential sellers will start to come out of the woodwork. It always happens and I dare say Banbury is as conservative as most areas so vendors will soon start to emerge for their winter hibernation.
Andehh said:
LordFlathead - any chance you could remove the whole of my first post from your reply?
One of the 'security' bits i had in mind was removing my opening post/the bulk of it when I was going to put the letters through peoples doors. First thing I would do is google a few sentences if I received a letter like this to try and find out more/if it was a scam.
The first thing I thought when I read it was 'scam' too.One of the 'security' bits i had in mind was removing my opening post/the bulk of it when I was going to put the letters through peoples doors. First thing I would do is google a few sentences if I received a letter like this to try and find out more/if it was a scam.
By leaving it here to be Google spidered would actually inspire confidence!
I get letters like this now and again - but from recognised estate agents. I'd suggest if you contact a local agent, they might do the mailshot for you.
You're much more likely to get a response and this will far outweigh the benefit of a few grand in potential estate agent savings to the seller.
Andehh said:
Hi guys,
I am looking to do a 'letter drop' in a neighborhood we would like to purchase a house in. Seeing as this letter will be read by a couple dozen random people I am keen to receive feedback and advice on how the letter sounds?
''
Dear Sir/Madam,
My partner and I wish to move to Banbury within the next few months. As such we are looking to purchase a property in this area and have decided to try and approach homeowners directly. Whilst this is an unorthodox method, the potential to save on estate agent fees (£4-5000), and the prospect of an easy, no hassle sale helped us decide to try it and see what happens.
To clarify, we are cash buyers, we have no chain and are happy to exchange quickly and delay completion allowing you four or five months to house hunt for yourselves. This would put you in an effective ‘cash buyer’ situation. We are also more than happy to provide details of the solicitor we used to sell our house in Sussex to authenticateus and prove we are serious about this venture.
If you are interested in selling your property, or know of anyone else in the area who may be, then I would be happy to meet and discuss any questions you may have and explain in more detail what we are after and our approach. I WOULD CUT THIS Again, whilst unorthodox I can assure you we do not want to cause anyone undue hassle or concern.
Thank you for your time.
Name & Name
Mobile Number
Secondary, but still 'professional' e-mail
Any suggestions?
cheers guys
edited wfollowing feedback!
Edits in italics. I have cut a couple of words too. (just my opinion, your original is fine for most people)I am looking to do a 'letter drop' in a neighborhood we would like to purchase a house in. Seeing as this letter will be read by a couple dozen random people I am keen to receive feedback and advice on how the letter sounds?
''
Dear Sir/Madam,
My partner and I wish to move to Banbury within the next few months. As such we are looking to purchase a property in this area and have decided to try and approach homeowners directly. Whilst this is an unorthodox method, the potential to save on estate agent fees (£4-5000), and the prospect of an easy, no hassle sale helped us decide to try it and see what happens.
To clarify, we are cash buyers, we have no chain and are happy to exchange quickly and delay completion allowing you four or five months to house hunt for yourselves. This would put you in an effective ‘cash buyer’ situation. We are also more than happy to provide details of the solicitor we used to sell our house in Sussex to authenticateus and prove we are serious about this venture.
If you are interested in selling your property, or know of anyone else in the area who may be, then I would be happy to meet and discuss any questions you may have and explain in more detail what we are after and our approach. I WOULD CUT THIS Again, whilst unorthodox I can assure you we do not want to cause anyone undue hassle or concern.
Thank you for your time.
Name & Name
Mobile Number
Secondary, but still 'professional' e-mail
Any suggestions?
cheers guys
edited wfollowing feedback!
Edited by Andehh on Thursday 28th February 12:14
Edited by Andehh on Thursday 28th February 14:07
Thanks for all the feedback guys! All very appreciated.
I do admittedly weaken my position when it comes to agreeing on a price this way, but seeing as a lot of the places we like the look of are copy & paste jobs from a house 2 doors up (ie 5 variations of house built 1000 times) I am hoping that having seen a few for sale/sold via Zoopla I have a rough idea of what I can expect based on décor & garden arrangement - about all that changes with these houses.
I do admittedly weaken my position when it comes to agreeing on a price this way, but seeing as a lot of the places we like the look of are copy & paste jobs from a house 2 doors up (ie 5 variations of house built 1000 times) I am hoping that having seen a few for sale/sold via Zoopla I have a rough idea of what I can expect based on décor & garden arrangement - about all that changes with these houses.
Depends how you pushed it.
If its a likely probate and its been boarded for months then another piece of junk mail littering the hall is unlikely to yield results (but has got to be worth the effort).
Probably a more effective route would be to put out feelers to see if you can't get hold of surviving family in the hope you can pursuade them to sell privately. In most cases, though, there are at least two beneficiaries and very quickly it gets tediously complicated and there are months of squabbles before the executors (usually) do the correct thing and put it out for OMV.
If its a likely probate and its been boarded for months then another piece of junk mail littering the hall is unlikely to yield results (but has got to be worth the effort).
Probably a more effective route would be to put out feelers to see if you can't get hold of surviving family in the hope you can pursuade them to sell privately. In most cases, though, there are at least two beneficiaries and very quickly it gets tediously complicated and there are months of squabbles before the executors (usually) do the correct thing and put it out for OMV.
LordFlathead said:
Yes! Don't do it! 
"we do not want to cause anyone undue hassle or concern"
Not professional and makes you sound like an easy target.
This approach generates unacceptable exposure to professional thieves and generates huge personal risks IMO. Distributing hundreds of leaflets with "we are pure cash buyers" (with enough of it to buy a house) to random strangers wakes up every rogue and villain in the neighbourhood.
We are in a recession, there are a lot more opportunists doing nothing these days.. you also plan in putting your address on it? How long would it take a pro burglar to find your cash, bank cards, cheques etc? Have you really thought this through? At least with a bonafide estate agent you will have tracability of your enquires. With this you simply have no idea who reads it or throws the leaflet on the street for anyone to read.
I've been in and out of the security industry for over 20 years.. and this makes my sheckles go up! Sounds like a horrendous risk to try and save a few £k IMO
I'm betting ex-cop"we do not want to cause anyone undue hassle or concern"
Not professional and makes you sound like an easy target.This approach generates unacceptable exposure to professional thieves and generates huge personal risks IMO. Distributing hundreds of leaflets with "we are pure cash buyers" (with enough of it to buy a house) to random strangers wakes up every rogue and villain in the neighbourhood.
We are in a recession, there are a lot more opportunists doing nothing these days.. you also plan in putting your address on it? How long would it take a pro burglar to find your cash, bank cards, cheques etc? Have you really thought this through? At least with a bonafide estate agent you will have tracability of your enquires. With this you simply have no idea who reads it or throws the leaflet on the street for anyone to read.
I've been in and out of the security industry for over 20 years.. and this makes my sheckles go up! Sounds like a horrendous risk to try and save a few £k IMO
They think everyone is a criminal
We did this, but it did nothing for us. I don't think anyone minded, it's just a question of getting lucky with the timing, and catching them at the point of deciding to sell. You won't do any harm.
We live in Deddington 6 miles south of Banbury. In the end we sold, and then rented; waiting for a property to become available in the village. Took 8 months but was worth it in the end.
We live in Deddington 6 miles south of Banbury. In the end we sold, and then rented; waiting for a property to become available in the village. Took 8 months but was worth it in the end.
Paul Drawmer said:
We did this, but it did nothing for us. I don't think anyone minded, it's just a question of getting lucky with the timing, and catching them at the point of deciding to sell. You won't do any harm.
We live in Deddington 6 miles south of Banbury. In the end we sold, and then rented; waiting for a property to become available in the village. Took 8 months but was worth it in the end.
I bought a steak from a butcher in Deddington once that cost me 13 quid! Just a raw steak! We live in Deddington 6 miles south of Banbury. In the end we sold, and then rented; waiting for a property to become available in the village. Took 8 months but was worth it in the end.
Andehh said:
LordFlathead - any chance you could remove the whole of my first post from your reply?
One of the 'security' bits i had in mind was removing my opening post/the bulk of it when I was going to put the letters through peoples doors. First thing I would do is google a few sentences if I received a letter like this to try and find out more/if it was a scam.
Done Sir, however now you need to ask Pot hole too One of the 'security' bits i had in mind was removing my opening post/the bulk of it when I was going to put the letters through peoples doors. First thing I would do is google a few sentences if I received a letter like this to try and find out more/if it was a scam.
McWigglebum3rd said:
I'm betting ex-cop
They think everyone is a criminal
No, not even close, and I certainly do not think everyone is a crim. They think everyone is a criminal
I was a 'well built company director' of a security company or however the saying goes
Being in the security industry, especially where intruder alarms are concerned, you end up talking to a lot of CPO's and you learn from them how the intruders think. After all, no security company wants to get a reputation as having 'easy systems' so you always do your utmost to try and out-wit the opponent. It's very much a game of chess when you're up against a seasoned villain, they know a lot of very unorthodox approaches for buggering up your systems
Thank you! Hopefully Pot Hole will spot this thread, however this is the internet....once on it never comes off. There is weight to the fact that if they google it they wont find anything I wouldn't be happy to tell them anyway truth be told! Those websites are all under a different name!
Got a couple dozen letters printed off so will go wandering later this afternoon. Thanks again for all the suggestions guys
Got a couple dozen letters printed off so will go wandering later this afternoon. Thanks again for all the suggestions guys
Andehh said:
Thank you! Hopefully Pot Hole will spot this thread, however this is the internet....once on it never comes off. There is weight to the fact that if they google it they wont find anything I wouldn't be happy to tell them anyway truth be told! Those websites are all under a different name!
Got a couple dozen letters printed off so will go wandering later this afternoon. Thanks again for all the suggestions guys
You are aware that even a well thought out, targeted mailshot will have a response rate of less than 1%?Got a couple dozen letters printed off so will go wandering later this afternoon. Thanks again for all the suggestions guys
That means in this case, even if you printed off a thousand you'd be lucky if you got a single phone call.
...and I still think that you'd much more likely get a response if you approached an agent and they did all the legwork for you and leafleted a few hundred properties rather than your 20 - and if it were me, and I wanted to sell my house, I'd respond to an agent rather than a random chap's letter.
I wish you the best of luck anyway!
I'm a man who has been very very lucky in life, so i like those odds! I also have 30 letters to be handed out in this first run... I just improved my chances by 30% 
As for you saying you would only respond to an Agent's letter over 'my' letter... the ONLY difference is that the headed paper from the Estate Agent would cost you almost £5000.
I can understand the safety net of people wanting to do everything the traditional way... but all an estate agent are is a middle man. They introduce us together, we then hand it over to solicitors and then job done. They have no legal sway, no expertise in the contracts & law, no opinion on your house and will tell seller/buyer whatever it takes for the deal to be done.
Fair enough a good Estate Agent can help with passing details back & forth and chasing up...but nothing that will make/break the deal or nothing that either party is incapable of doing themselves.
Very much each to their own, and I appreciate the feedback.
edit; As for going via Estate Agents, I have been in touch with 5-7 of them in the area and contact them all weekly, told them everything they want to know and more and I would say only 2-3 of them act even remotely interested. Most of them didn't even bother adding me to their system on the first round of calls I made to them!
I made a different thread to let off steam about that though...
One thing I have noticed is the younger the Estate Agent I deal with, the more enthusiastic and interested they are!
I also have 30 letters to be handed out in this first run... I just improved my chances by 30% As for you saying you would only respond to an Agent's letter over 'my' letter... the ONLY difference is that the headed paper from the Estate Agent would cost you almost £5000.
I can understand the safety net of people wanting to do everything the traditional way... but all an estate agent are is a middle man. They introduce us together, we then hand it over to solicitors and then job done. They have no legal sway, no expertise in the contracts & law, no opinion on your house and will tell seller/buyer whatever it takes for the deal to be done.
Fair enough a good Estate Agent can help with passing details back & forth and chasing up...but nothing that will make/break the deal or nothing that either party is incapable of doing themselves.
Very much each to their own, and I appreciate the feedback.
edit; As for going via Estate Agents, I have been in touch with 5-7 of them in the area and contact them all weekly, told them everything they want to know and more and I would say only 2-3 of them act even remotely interested. Most of them didn't even bother adding me to their system on the first round of calls I made to them!
I made a different thread to let off steam about that though...One thing I have noticed is the younger the Estate Agent I deal with, the more enthusiastic and interested they are!
Edited by Andehh on Friday 1st March 11:15
Andehh said:
I'm a man who has been very very lucky in life, so i like those odds!
As for you saying you would only respond to an Agent's letter over 'my' letter... the ONLY difference is that the headed paper from the Estate Agent would cost you almost £5000.
I can understand the safety net of people wanting to do everything the traditional way... but all an estate agent are is a middle man. they introduce us together, we then hand it over to solicitors and then job done.
Fair enough a good Estate Agent can help with passing details back & forth and chasing up...but nothing that will make/break the deal or nothing that either party is incapable of doing.
No, there's not one, but three differences between your letter and an estate agent's one.As for you saying you would only respond to an Agent's letter over 'my' letter... the ONLY difference is that the headed paper from the Estate Agent would cost you almost £5000.
I can understand the safety net of people wanting to do everything the traditional way... but all an estate agent are is a middle man. they introduce us together, we then hand it over to solicitors and then job done.
Fair enough a good Estate Agent can help with passing details back & forth and chasing up...but nothing that will make/break the deal or nothing that either party is incapable of doing.
1) The recipient knows that the estate agent's letter is legitimate.
2) The recipient knows that they won't get ripped off with an estate agent's letter.
3) The recipient knows that with an estate agent's letter they won't have to meet a random, potentially dodgy person to talk about selling a huge asset.
My first thought, as I've mentioned would be 'Why did he not just ask an agent if he wants to buy a house?' 'Is this all just to save me £5,000?' 'Or even if this is legitimate, is he most likely just going to absorb my £5000 saving into his offer anyway?"
Scan reading your letter - which is what recipients will do, and paraphrasing it, it is something like this:
Andehh's letter scan read said:
Dear Sir/Madam,
We want to buy your house, and we can save you a bit of money. I know this is strange, but we're trying anyway. We are 'cash buyers'. Just to reiterate, we have cash for your house.
Please can you contact me so we can meet up to discuss this? Please don't be concerned, this is totally legitimate.
Yours.
All you'd need to do is change 'Dear Sir/Madam' to 'Dear Trusted Friend' and sign off with 'God bless you and your family' and change your name to an over anglicised name like 'Churchill Jones' and you'd have a template for a scam letter.We want to buy your house, and we can save you a bit of money. I know this is strange, but we're trying anyway. We are 'cash buyers'. Just to reiterate, we have cash for your house.
Please can you contact me so we can meet up to discuss this? Please don't be concerned, this is totally legitimate.
Yours.
Please, don't take this the wrong way, but there is a reason why sellers choose to use an agent, as for a few grand they do provide a service that sellers are happy to pay.
Fair enough, cant argue with that and that's why I came to Pistonheads to try and de-scam the letter as best I can! We will wait and see, and worse case scenario is I fall back on waiting for the Estate Agents to do their job.
As I said on a previous post though, whether I hear anything back form these letters also educates me as to the potential for houses to come up in the future from that area. If there are people in that area thinking of selling soon they would probably drop me an e-mail just to ask me more about what I am playing at. If 100% of letters go in the bin then I learn that it is unlikely that any of them will be moving on & selling up anytime soon and I know I may need to compromise on the exact requirements we have for our next house!
As I said on a previous post though, whether I hear anything back form these letters also educates me as to the potential for houses to come up in the future from that area. If there are people in that area thinking of selling soon they would probably drop me an e-mail just to ask me more about what I am playing at. If 100% of letters go in the bin then I learn that it is unlikely that any of them will be moving on & selling up anytime soon and I know I may need to compromise on the exact requirements we have for our next house!
Edited by Andehh on Friday 1st March 11:41
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