Angry at house seller?

Removing and taking the radiators seems very unusual, as this will undoubtedly leave gaps/new fittings that will change the house. May need re plastering etc.

light fixings seems less strange though I can understand why you would feel a bit gutted about this.

Fascinating what people say is fine with house sale. Imagine dealership advertising car with xx nice features and when you start filling paperwork they will tell you that it actually doesn't come with x and y, but hey ho, live with it.
There would be uproar and investigation into the dealership practices.

But somehow it's fine on £xxxxx houses....

It is shitty. People expect radiators and such to stay as they are. You offered with these kn mind. I would ask for reduction on price to be able to swap like for like.
No one sane would expect that radiators you see on viewing and are in the pictures are not included.
Light fixtures, ok, people do that.

The survey and searches are not the same as the PIF at all - the structure is the structure, whatever the land registry has is what it is - neither are in the seller’s control. There are also costs associated with each which mean they are always done later in the process.

However it is entirely up to the seller what she says is included in the sale a) when advertising the property and b) when negotiating the purchase price. She had at least two opportunities to explain she’d be stripping the property down to the wires before the buyer committed any further time and expense, and she chose not to, which was cynical and dishonest.

I am really surprised at this behaviour and attitude by a seller in the current market. (eg “I took your calls when others sellers would not”). If I were the OP I’d be walking away and finding another property - there are plenty on the market at the moment and great bargains to be had.

@no18currentowner

you’re absolutely batshit crazy. I don’t care how many houses you have bought/sold, taking radiators is utterly bizarre behaviour.

of course you’re entitled to behave badly - mostly the law doesn’t protect against arseholes, just dishonest ones - and you’ve escaped that by the skin of your teeth. It would however have been far more reasonable to have made it clear that you weren’t leaving the rads at the beginning of the discussion. 1) because it impacts on the process OP might want to pay and 2) because it would have highlighted to OP that she’s dealing with someone who operates outside of the norms.

quick q are you also swapping out the nice kitchen and new bathroom?!

#teambuyer

Rads, defo a bit odd. When I move, I’m taking the two light fixtures and will therefore leave either a hanging cord/basic rose or a cheap shade. I looked for a similar fitting and couldn’t find one so it’s coming with me.

I mean I get it especially if you made the offer because you loved these features. But yabu as they can take with them what they please as long as they are replaced. If it's such a big deal pull out of the sale.

its fine to be disappointed, the radiators is annoying and will be expensive snd a faff to replace (basic rads are v ugly by comparison).

I think it’s perfectly reasonable to say that you are reducing your offer to reflect the cost and inconvenience of having to reinstate the better quality radiators.

how far you want to push it depends on how much you want the house (and how much they want to sell it)

They are not obliged to leave anything you can make an offer for them. However you can insist they make good any damage made by removing items ie radiators

I should clarify that I meant it's totally normal for a seller to list what they are taking on the fixtures and fittings form, to want to take these things i.e. what they intend to take from the house. Nothing underhanded about it if it's on the form and that they intend to replace the rads, that's part of the negotiation part to me.

Anyhoo, looks like OP won't be getting any of the house now as the vendor has seen her complaints on here so its by the by.

I was quite clear - showing a superior product to get a high offer and then changing it to a less good product is a standard bait and switch scam. That’s dishonest. That the buying process allows for some dishonesty in sales without it being illegal doesn’t stop it from being dishonest.

i would be questioning if they can take the fixtures. I would be reducing nt offer as you will have to replace these things

Two things I want to know

How do they remove a mirror that has been presumably glued on to a wall

And will they be paying for another survey to get the new energy rating after they have removed the column radiators and replaced then with smaller rads
Radiators are taken account of in the energy survey

I'm another that was surprised at the agreement in the first few posts. Glad some more sensible people have arrived! As a pp said, rule of thumb is that anything that wouldn't fall down if the house were turned upside down and shaken, stays. Light sconces, radiator and bathroom mirror all fall in that category. If not they should have been specified at point of advertisement.

The posters saying 'well they paid for them' are being ridiculous and illogical. Presumably if they redecorated they might have paid for new flooring, carpet, boiler and bathroom suite as well, should they be allowed to take them?

Apart from anything else, did you have/are you having a survey done? Presumably the surveyor checked things like lighting, heating, etc with those fixtures in place, not completely different ones, that you'll have no idea work or not.

I wouldn't be happy with this. It would seriously make me rethink the purchase, but a pp made a good suggestion which is that they take the cost of the replacement fixture (and cost of fitting them which wouldn't be insignificant) off the purchase price so you can get similar reinstalled yourself. I'd want it to be a decent amount though.

The inventory comes when it comes. it would be better to require it before offer maybe, but that’s not how it’s done. Best not to get attached to anything or to ask the seller before making an offer.

Funnily enough there’s another recent thread where the OP mentions seller taking the radiators.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/property/5426939-can-seller-change-things-in-the-property-between-offer-and-completion

I bet they wouldn’t have argued about replacement radiators!

There's loads of stuff you don't know after the offer until the sale goes through though. That's why we have surveys after the offer is accepted. No money changes hands until after all of that is sorted out.
Agreed, OP could seek to renegotiate the price, or try to buy the radiators, or pull out. Lots of people do that after various things come up on the checks and survey.

I don't disagree that this would be unexpected, and perhaps disappointing and frustrating if OP particularly liked the radiators/mirror/whatever, but it's not dishonest.

Very late in the process for something any reasonable viewer would have expected to be included in the sale.

I think that was deliberate.

I have never heard of anyone ever taking radiators with them. Light fixtures yes, mirrors yes. But not radiators!

I think something as unusual as the intention to swop out what I assume are attractive, feature radiators with much cheaper standard radiators should be flagged at the viewing stage.

the seller and estate agent aren’t naive enough to think this would cause an issue - they just hoped the buyer would be so far into them process they wouldn’t object.

It’s always best to be honest,- that would have been the fair thing to do. I wouldn’t want to do business like this so I would walk away.

The issue I think is that a seller doesn’t share the PIF (document where they list all the items and say whether they are included or excluded) until AFTER the offer has been made and accepted. So usually buyers have to make reasonable assumptions about what will be left behind when they make their offer. When the PIF turns out to exclude a lot of items that you might reasonably assume to come with the property, which some might say is dishonest, then the only option is to renegotiate the purchase price.

Knock the value off your offer.

My solicitor told me that fixtures stay with the house, and by fixtures it means, if you flipped your house upside down, anything that wouldn’t move. Eg you can’t rip out your carpet and take it with you.
Anything else, you can either take or negotiate to sell to the buyer.

Radiators are fittings, any price negotiations were on the fittings as seen unless they.re excluded from the original valuation. I would be tempted to reduce my offer by a factor enough to replace them.

What on earth is dishonest!? The seller literally listed on the documents that she would be taking the current radiators and swapping them. That is honest! Dishonest would be saying the house comes with radiators and taking them out entirely. Shady but not necessarily dishonest would be saying the house comes with radiators and not mentioning that they weren't the ones in the property when it was viewed.

Of course you think OP should have stuck to her solicitor, Dishonest people rarely like daylight. Don’t want to see your scammy bait and switch tactic laid out for the world?

The poster has literally explained why they indicated they would take the radiators, the light and the mirror. A lot of people have agreed they’d take the two latter items. Nowhere has the OP said anything about lightbulbs and door handles.

The whole point of the inventory form is to say what will and won’t be left behind. The seller has done that and the OP doesn’t like it - so tell the seller and start there.

Tbh if I was the seller and I’d seen this I’d withdraw from the process. There will always be other buyers.