How should I enquire about land that is not for sale?

Llee94

Llee94

Well-Known Member
Joined
1 October 2014
Messages
597
Location
Devon
Visit site
Sorry for the babbling post. Well done if you make it to the end! :)

So as some of you may have seen in a previous post, I am currently house hunting. The original property I wrote a thread about sold before our viewing, so it was back to the drawing board for us.
The pressure is now on as my boyfriend has sold his flat in our local city and the buyer wants to be in within 28 days, so we are madly trying to view as many houses as possible so that he is not left homeless or having to rent somewhere.
We are going to see one tonight which is in the perfect location for my new job and my boyfriends place of work, it is close to both our families and will make a lovely home with a bit of TLC. The one thing it doesn't have is any land for my horses but it does have a field right next to it which is about 3 acres and I believe is owned by one of the neighbouring properties. I have been to this area a few times and I have never seen anything in it, so the plan is to try and buy the field as well.
How would you go about approaching them? Some people have said to just knock on their door and speak to them in person but others have said to write a letter. The field is the deal breaker so I just want to make sure I get it right and don't give a bad impression.
 
Llee94 said:
Sorry for the babbling post. Well done if you make it to the end! :)

So as some of you may have seen in a previous post, I am currently house hunting. The original property I wrote a thread about sold before our viewing, so it was back to the drawing board for us.
The pressure is now on as my boyfriend has sold his flat in our local city and the buyer wants to be in within 28 days, so we are madly trying to view as many houses as possible so that he is not left homeless or having to rent somewhere.
We are going to see one tonight which is in the perfect location for my new job and my boyfriends place of work, it is close to both our families and will make a lovely home with a bit of TLC. The one thing it doesn't have is any land for my horses but it does have a field right next to it which is about 3 acres and I believe is owned by one of the neighbouring properties. I have been to this area a few times and I have never seen anything in it, so the plan is to try and buy the field as well.
How would you go about approaching them? Some people have said to just knock on their door and speak to them in person but others have said to write a letter. The field is the deal breaker so I just want to make sure I get it right and don't give a bad impression.
Click to expand...

I think either method is fine and unlikely to cause offence (unless you try knocking on the door at 3am :p) but if you knock on the door at least you know you will definitely get an answer. You may find that they don't want to sell initially but would be happy to rent. Be super polite and friendly and you'll be more likely to get what you want :). We found our field (to rent) when my sister drove round yards looking for stables. On one yard, which was full, she ran into the YO's dad who happened to be a farmer; he took a liking to her and offered a field to rent complete with field shelter and automatic water trough. I always think you never know unless you ask. But I do think it is better to go round in person, purely because if you put a letter through the door you may never get an answer if they don't want to sell and (if you're anything like me) you'll spend the next few weeks on edge all the time waiting for a phone call that never comes!
 
Personally I would knock. This is actually how I came to rent my little yard. I think it's better than writing a letter as they can see that you are in fact a normal person!
 
Agree with the above :)
Next-door-but-1 yard sold to a 'knocker' as owners were only 'thinking' of putting the 3 acres & 3 stables on the market at that point, but they liked the lady so agreed terms.
Also, several local livery spaces were found this way too, for renting fields.

Good luck! :)
 
Definitely go in person - when I moved to this area I did that and it was a case of "Well, I haven't anything to offer but try ......." - a short chain of visits later I found an ideal field to rent
 
Definitely knock and ask, before we put ponies on our land, we used to get a spate of spring enquiries usually notes through the door as out at work all day and I used to save them up sometimes for a few weeks, write a duplicate reply print it off and post off, later as more folk got email I'd compose a sorry but no email and send 5 or 6 in one go. Now we have ponies on the land it's only the 'can we buy it to build a house on' notes we get, and I still tend to put them on one side and save them all up and do in batches so can sometimes take a few weeks to get a reply whereas the blokes who stand on the doorstep (and won't go away because they don't believe we don't want to sell) that get an answer immediately. It's 'no' if you're thinking of asking BTW! We're right on the edge of suburbia and a main dog walk /walk to the pub route, so everyone thinks how handy it'd be as they walk past hence the number of enquiries.
 
I would knock as you need to know sooner rather than later. Apologise in case you are interrupting something and offer to come back at better time if needed. You might want to enquire about renting first if they are reluctant to sell.
 
Thanks all. House was great but needs a lot of work. We knocked on the door of the lady who owned the field (turns out she owns most of the land surrounding the village). She started off saying she wouldn't sell the land but after a couple of minutes of chatting she seemed to have changed her tune and asked for our contact details so that she could ring me once she had spoken to her sister who keeps some livestock on it. Fingers crossed she gets back to me with good news and not a huge price tag.
 
If you can't find out who owns it by door knocking try contacting the local parish council for the area thats how I found someone who owned land near me when I was looking to move back in January but in the end the YO where I am contacted me so moved to hers instead.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top