Buy our rented house?

lorweld

Hi myself and partner are in process of getting mortgage approval and are looking around at available houses. We are currently renting a property for nearly 4 years and have had our two kids here (3 and 8months old) so its really become our 'Home'. We are wondering what the best way to approach our landlord about the possibility of buying this property, he is very well known and in public eye and I don't believe he has any financial concerns so not sure if he would have any interest in selling. Should we get a valuation on the property before approaching him or should we let him decide first! Houses in the same estate are fetching between 65k-100k for same house type, ours isn't in the best shape as it only being a rented property he never cared about it, example we were promised that whole house would be painted when we moved in and still no sign of it almost 4 years later, all floors are thrown together and need to be redone but we are happy to do all of this as we know the house is structurally sound and we know all our neighbours pretty well.
I would just love to know if anyone else has done this and what is best way forward as we don't want to seem to keen for him only to hike up price but want him to seriously consider the sale to us.
Thanks in advance!

TheDriver

If i was him and interested in selling, i would probably put it on open market. Plus he may want to keep his property portfolio. You are just a renter in his business. By all means ask but maybe you should see what else is out there for your cash

davo10

Houses may be selling for 65-100k now but there is a good chance that it cost more when bought. Prices seem to be rising though not in rural towns where at that price, I suspect this house is. You could say that you are looking to buy a house and would he be interested in selling. By putting it this way to him you are telling him two things, " I'm moving out so you will have the hassle of finding new tenants and probably spend money doing up house, and, I want to make you an offer for a house" . The worst he can say is "no", expect to pay more than adjacent houses though, he will know you have an emotional attachment to this one and that you also will not want the hassle of house searching.

The_Conductor

Price in Laois have been doing interesting things in the last 2-3 months- looking at some estates they went up 10-15% in asking in the month of June alone.

You may get a little bit of a surprise when you go and get the valuation done.

Vis- contacting the landlord- nothing ventured, nothing gained. If he is insistent that he is not selling- thats it. He might like to lock in the price rises of the last 6 months into cold hard cash though.

Ask though- there really isn't anything to be gained by humming and hawing over it.

Pinkycharm

I would go ahead and ask, seriously. When I was renting, and thinking of buying I did ask my landlord if she would ever sell the property I was in because the thoughts of moving all my stuff (I'm a teacher and all those books are heavy!!) just seemed like such effort and I was really settled there. I told her I was looking to buy in the near future and would be giving my notice once I found a place. She said she wasn't interested and that was grand, I stayed renting until I found a place that i could do up myself to what I wanted. The day I was moving out she called me saying that she was rethinking the offer. Too late. In a far better house now that I really love as my home.

In saying that I would have been really happy where I was too.

Just ask