Prospective 'letter drop' in area we want to buy
Discussion
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 home owners 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 give it a go and see what happens.
To clarify, we are pure cash buyers, we have no chain or mortgage 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 authentic ourselves 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. 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!
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 home owners 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 give it a go and see what happens.
To clarify, we are pure cash buyers, we have no chain or mortgage 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 authentic ourselves 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. 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
May well do, but estate agents would charge an easy £4000 to introduce me to them (thats all they do...), and then we would take it form there. All i am doing is hoping that a few people have thought of/consider moving on. There is nothing illegal/immoral about it. Everything would still be done via solicitors etc, just an Estate Agent hasn't introduced us.
As for scam - hence me leaving mobile, e-mail address etc and option to contact my solicitor to verify who I am & selling of my property!
Updated original post following feedback!
Cheers guys
As for scam - hence me leaving mobile, e-mail address etc and option to contact my solicitor to verify who I am & selling of my property!
Updated original post following feedback!
Cheers guys
Yep, we are in the very fortunate position to have sold our last place and we owned it outright. Money is due in my bank account within the next 48 hours (touch wood). Only ''mortgage'' is within the family so will not effect any of this.
And yes, Estate Agents are just an expensive errand boy which just slows down communication and sticks a page on the internet.... then charges you a fortunate and go home feeling like they have completed a hard days work!
And yes, Estate Agents are just an expensive errand boy which just slows down communication and sticks a page on the internet.... then charges you a fortunate and go home feeling like they have completed a hard days work!
Will be putting some letters out tomorrow! Thanks for the suggestions guys
...and yes if people want to sell they can go through the traditional channels, but a lot of people will just 'make do' with current place to avoid the hassle, stress and cost. What I effectively offer is no hassle and the very best position to be in for someone wanting to upgrade/move on.
They 'sell' the house to me on paper, contracts signed and exchanged. Set a 'completion date' for 5 months away...they now have 5 months where all they need to do is find a house they like and buy it with my money, via a completion date earlier then originally agreed.
I am aiming for the people who have ummed & arred in the passed about moving on, but avoided it due to the worry of being stuck in a chain and not wanting the stress.
...and yes if people want to sell they can go through the traditional channels, but a lot of people will just 'make do' with current place to avoid the hassle, stress and cost. What I effectively offer is no hassle and the very best position to be in for someone wanting to upgrade/move on.
They 'sell' the house to me on paper, contracts signed and exchanged. Set a 'completion date' for 5 months away...they now have 5 months where all they need to do is find a house they like and buy it with my money, via a completion date earlier then originally agreed.
I am aiming for the people who have ummed & arred in the passed about moving on, but avoided it due to the worry of being stuck in a chain and not wanting the stress.
Very fair comments! I will adjust the letter accordingly.
I am happy to for e-mail address to be there, and the address I have given is the Landlord's address of where we are atm. We actually live in his garden in a garden annex, so no way of people actually 'finding' our front door.
All bank details and important documents are with a family member atm, since we moved out of our main house and landlord has keys to our flat I don't trust any of them to be stored with us.
Thanks for the advice though!
I am happy to for e-mail address to be there, and the address I have given is the Landlord's address of where we are atm. We actually live in his garden in a garden annex, so no way of people actually 'finding' our front door.
All bank details and important documents are with a family member atm, since we moved out of our main house and landlord has keys to our flat I don't trust any of them to be stored with us.
Thanks for the advice though!
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.
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.
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
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
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
No luck so far. Only 30 odd houses so was never getting my hopes up, but would definitely have been nice avoiding the Estate Agents!
As for what we are after.... the seemingly rare, unique and virtually non existent package that is a 4 bed detached, with a double garage within Banbury/few miles of it!
(there are a few up for sale in Brackley, but seeing as the High Speed 2 rail route runs worryingly close to it, and they have a chicken plucking factory there we have discounted it!)
As for what we are after.... the seemingly rare, unique and virtually non existent package that is a 4 bed detached, with a double garage within Banbury/few miles of it!
(there are a few up for sale in Brackley, but seeing as the High Speed 2 rail route runs worryingly close to it, and they have a chicken plucking factory there we have discounted it!)
Fraid not, only read the replies after I had got back!
Either way, these are all acts of frustration after missing the house that was for sale in the area. Sadly, had that house been found a couple of months/several weeks into our search once we had looked around several other properties I am in no doubt we would have paid asking for it just because of the lack of anything close to it!
Still cant believe my luck, 7 months on the market at that price (a year on the market in total) and it sells the week after our first trip to the house/area!
Either way, these are all acts of frustration after missing the house that was for sale in the area. Sadly, had that house been found a couple of months/several weeks into our search once we had looked around several other properties I am in no doubt we would have paid asking for it just because of the lack of anything close to it!
Still cant believe my luck, 7 months on the market at that price (a year on the market in total) and it sells the week after our first trip to the house/area!
Gassing Station | Homes, Gardens and DIY | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff