Mortgage house valution surveys

[filthy1980]

I had one where the surveyor thought the house was worth 10k less than the asking price so the bank refused the mortgage and the seller had to drop the price.

hmmmm considering i had to bid above the asking price in a best and final situation this is interesting

[ChimpMaster]

I had one where the surveyor thought the house was worth 10k less than the asking price so the bank refused the mortgage and the seller had to drop the price.

This is happening more and more now, with the market having boomed this past couple of years and sellers becoming somewhat unrealistic as to the possibility of a slowdown. I've seen a lot of 'sold' properties come back on to the market at a reduced price because the surveys put a realistic price tag on them, which means that the mortgage is refused at that LTV.

We bought one house last year at £265k but the valuation came in at £260k. We had to stump up the extra £5k on the deposit because prices were moving very fast. In that case the surveyor was wrong because he hadn't taken account of market conditions though perhaps he didn't have comparables to work with.

[Scruff]

My wife is a Mortgage Advisor / Consultant and she is experiencing that "Valuation Surveys" are occasionally coming back with a lower value than the Sale Value. This is usually in areas where there have not been (m)any recent sales, so there is no tracker of values for similar homes, in similar areas.

[Support Monkey]

He will sit in his car outside the house for 5 minutes doing some paperwork and lo and behold his analysis will be that the house is worth exactly what you are paying for it....

It is the surveyors remit confirm to the lender the house is worth the money they are lending against it and no more.

Normally I agree with everything NLUK says but in this instance I have to disagree

I was expecting just a drive past survey on a property and got refused a mortgage due to damage on an outside wall they wouldn't give us the money until we had a structural survey done, Luckily I already had one so I passed this on and they agreed to the mortgage, at the end of the day the surveyor must be accredited and therefor is liable, if the mortgage company lend on a property that turns out to be worth less than the survey said then they could be held responsible for the Loss

[AtW]

It's just a check to see if your house is actually there. If it's there, it's worth whatever you want it to be. Houses only go up in price, so in theory, your house is worth any amount less than infinity over the long term.

Mine asked me upfront how much I am paying...

Basically the market price is whatever people prepared to pay for it, so if you are planning to spend £X then that's the market value

[SueEllen]

hmmmm considering i had to bid above the asking price in a best and final situation this is interesting

Nope it's not uncommon.

Even in a rising market like London, surveyors can turn around and say the property isn't worth that much. Happened to friends' of mine including one who had to bid for a house.

Basically the surveyor's valuation is to protect the mortgage lender if the market goes bust.

[FiveTimes]

There are occasions when they will say the house is worth less.

It happened to us last year. The valuation came in £25k short so the mortgage that we wanted required a certain % LTV so we tried negotiating but ended up walking away from the house.

[fullyautomatix]

He will sit in his car outside the house for 5 minutes doing some paperwork and lo and behold his analysis will be that the house is worth exactly what you are paying for it....

It is the surveyors remit confirm to the lender the house is worth the money they are lending against it and no more.

This isnt true anymore. Not sure when you bought your house and had a drive through survey, maybe 2007 ish. I bought a house few months ago and the mortgage was through Barclays. The survey cost was chucked on to me, around 350 ish, and it was a third party survey company which did it. I was sent a link to the survey by email and SMS, and it was a proper survey with photographs etc.

[Lightwave]

My wife is a Mortgage Advisor / Consultant and she is experiencing that "Valuation Surveys" are occasionally coming back with a lower value than the Sale Value. This is usually in areas where there have not been (m)any recent sales, so there is no tracker of values for similar homes, in similar areas.

If comparable houses have sold locally, valuation surveyors are doing the same search on Zoopla to get a value as the estate agents will have done. Then adjusting for condition or extensions etc.
We had a 'homebuyer's report' which had lots of useful info, like the distance in a straight line to the nearest pub, unfortunately that line crosses a well fenced dual carriageway and a railway line. We paid an extra £125 for that on top of £250 or so to satisfy First Direct's 40% mortgage.
There was some useful stuff, like how far away the once a century flood should be expected.

Previous house, value really was a matter of opinion, different estate agents wanted to put it on the market over 10% apart.
The house we've just bought, Zoopla valuation was kind of distorted by the fact that most houses in the development had only changed hands as empty plots.

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

Out of curiosity, does anybody know if its worth getting your house re-valued at the end of a mortgage deal if you feel there's a good chance its increased in value - not just due to market changes but if you've made significant improvements? I was going to raise it with my broker (still another year to run on our deal) but I calculate that even a £20k increase in value would be enough to get us from the 83% LTV we started with to below the 75% threshold and getting a better deal. I take Zoopla with a big pinch of salt but its showing a general increase of around that much in our area after only one year and thats before considering some of our improvements.