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AIBU?

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Original poster

WWYD if you'd sold your house and then someone offered you a lot more money?

139 replies

sweetheart · 14/07/2014 16:54

Dh and I accepted an offer on our house last week, today someone else has put in a considerably higher offer. Morally I feel wrong accepting the higher offer but the house dh and I are moving to needs a lot of work doing to it and then extra money we've been offered would pay for a new kitchen.

OP posts:
OrangeOwl · 15/07/2014 07:20

People do go for the F**k Morals option. Just check if it's for you by imagining how you would feel when you tell friends and family.

I couldn't do it.

Badvoc2 · 15/07/2014 07:21

Also bear in mind that if this buyer is a family member or friend the impact it could have long term....worth a few extra £k?

Plateofcrumbs · 15/07/2014 08:02

As someone said earlier, nothing is binding until exchange, and a lot can change between offer and exchange. You're not obliged to buy regardless of what changes, and equally you're nit obliged to sell. The person up the thread who said they refused to view another, potentially better, property a few hours after having an offer accepted on another place amazed me, I would have looked at the second property without hesitation.

Although technically this would count as gazumping, at an early stage when no-one has spent money is of a fairly low level (it's when it happens days before exchange and you have the original buyer over a barrel that it's really nasty). The only damage here is the disappointment that the would-be buyers will feel, and frankly if they are that despondent it will be a valuable lesson to them - so many sales fall through, it doesn't pay to get emotionally invested until contacts are signed.

BeckAndCall · 15/07/2014 08:13

You need to get best value out of the biggest asset you'll ever own.

Presumably the higher offer reflects the state of the market where you live and who's to say that the same is not going to happen with the house you are buying - someone puts in an offer above yours - you wouldn't be in a position to up your offer if you're sticking with a 'price' on your house which reflects a valuation that is now out of date.

QueenHaakonVII · 15/07/2014 08:23

Gazump into is awful and some of the stories on here are terrible but in the OPs case it has been less that a week. There have been no costs to the potential purchasers and she had stopped showing the house. It's gazump into but it's a very mild gazumping.

As for all the 'karma' stories - there is no way to know whether the original offer'ers are more worthy or more secure purchasers than the higher offer'ers.

If someone did this to me, at this very early stage, I would be a bit pissed off and dissapointed but I would understand

QueenHaakonVII · 15/07/2014 08:23

Sorry for typos..

Bluegrass · 15/07/2014 08:32

The acceptance of the offer would only have been conditional on satisfactory survey. The OP didn't say "I accept your offer but only on the basis that I don't get a better one later on". I suppose this is why the world needs contracts and lawyers, because otherwise there will always be people who try to weasel their way out of agreements as soon as think they can do better for themselves if they change the rules (and screw everyone els in the process).

In any event, some equally shady buyers will go in with offers far higher than they intend to pay just to push out the competition. Once you are hooked in and embedded in a chain they can find an excuse to drop the offer, possibly even lower than the one already accepted.

If OP takes this risk they will already be sending out a clear signal that they are mercenary, that it's all about money to them and a "handshake" means nothing. That's both a warning to the people making the new offer, telling them the sort of people they are buying from, and it's an invitation to drop any morality and start playing games of their own.

These transactions are so much less stressful when there is trust on both sides, but as a lot of responses have shown, there just aren't enough trustworthy people and so the whole thing breaks down into mutual suspicion, paranoia and every woman/man for themselves!

ConferencePear · 15/07/2014 08:40

We were lied to like this once. I still remember the couple who did it to us. I would never do it to anybody. Whatever happened to keeping your word ?

LongTimeLurking · 15/07/2014 09:03

MimiSunshine
"Because chances are, if in all honesty you know your house isn't worth that much more then ask yourselves why they've offered it and are they reliable? They could be doing it to get it and then gazunder you just before exchange."
This would be my concern. And if that happens the original buyers would have moved on and you face all the costs and stress of re-marketing the house again.

I don't have any moral object to this situation as the original buyers have not yet spent any cash on surveys and what not. If they had spent money then I think it would be wrong to dump them.

Plateofcrumbs · 15/07/2014 09:03

Irrespective of the 'morality' point you have to consider how 'good' each set of potential buyers are.

When we were in this situation, I didn't have a good feeling about the would-be buyers whose offer we had accepted. On paper they were ideal cash-buyers but my instinct said they would be trouble. On the other hand the buyers who came in with a later, higher offer felt 'right'. Even if there hadn't been money involved I would have been tempted to switch. As it was there was £15k at stake too!

OddFodd · 15/07/2014 09:31

It's not about the costs. It's about the fact that the OP has lied to her buyers. She told them they'd take it off the market and they haven't.

Oh, and I agree that the system is shit but that's the system we have. And really, do we need the state to act as moral arbiters? Can we not behave decently unless there are laws to stop us being duplicitous?

QueenHaakonVII · 15/07/2014 09:40

OddFodd. The OP did take it off the market. The higher offer was made from someone who saw the house before.

She hasn't lied.

OddFodd · 15/07/2014 09:48

Apologies - I misunderstood. I took the 'several viewings lined up' comment to mean that the OP went ahead with those viewings and it was as a result of those that the higher offer came in.

Sorry OP. You're not a liar but I still would say thanks but no thanks.

FelineLou · 15/07/2014 09:54

We were grateful to our sellers that they acted with integrity and refused a higher offer after accepting ours. We treated our buyers the same way.
We are not a greedy corporation and houses are not meant to be profit making but a place to live.
However a week is very little time. Did they offer the price you asked?

zippey · 15/07/2014 10:42

I think the view on this forum is 50:50

Sweetheart - I think you need to decide if you want to have the increased morals or the increased cash.

Original poster
sweetheart · 15/07/2014 11:52

Thanks for all the views, I understand all view points. To wrap this up a bit......

if the people we are buying from wanted to remarket their house in light that our chain has collapsed and tha market has moved in the last couple of months I wouldn't feel angry towards them. I would understand that they are just trying to get the best price possible and I wouldn't blame them for that.

I spoke to our original person and they understood - it was only a couple of days and no money had been spent. They are deciding if they want to change their offer.

We've had another offer put in since yesterday from a 3rd person who had already seen the house. Therefore we have told the estate agents to get us all full and final offers with full details of the status of each seller and we will make a final choice from there.

We are trying to be as fair as possible to everyone in this situation but a big part of that to me is also being fair to ourselves - if that makes me immoral I can live with that.

OP posts:
zippey · 15/07/2014 12:40

I dont think you are immoral. You are just getting the best deal for yourself and your family. Nothing wrong with that.

SuburbanRhonda · 15/07/2014 17:47

being fair to ourselves

That's a new one Hmm

Bluegrass · 15/07/2014 18:28

You might just want to clarify with everyone if your idea of accepting a "best and final" means "unless I get offered more money a week later". Just so you're all on the same page.

SiennaBlake · 15/07/2014 18:31

I hate the phrases being fair to myself or being fair to ourselves. It's just a weird way of saying putting myself first or ourselves first. Don't be ashamed of your choice! You're putting your family first, that's fine. Don't sugarcoat it as fairness though!

KnackeredMuchly · 15/07/2014 18:41

Well OP, if you think gazzumping is fair, I hope you also think the same of gazzundering if it happens to you. And yes, good luck with the survey showing any flaws that someone so ruthless will likely knock off your price, that the surveyors think the inflated price is worth it - and that no one tries to mark it down £10k on exchange of contracts day.

So, err, good luck.

MrsMaturin · 15/07/2014 19:04

I think you should have decided to go to best and final at the point you realised your house was attracting a lot of interest. Even then you run the risk of gazundering by desperate people trying to capture the house. I think that risk is increased now - everybody knows that you will take what you can get and so they will offer more than they want to pay and renegotiate later. Not good OP.

QueenHaakonVII · 15/07/2014 20:08

OP, I think you have done the right thing. If you are still getting more interest then it sounds like your estate agent may have undervalued it. So it's his fault Wink

I hope everything works out (and I mean that in a non passive aggressive way unlike a lot of the other posters on this thread Confused )

Silverdaisy · 15/07/2014 20:14

How does the work? In England do you get a value done on your house and then advertise for offers over. Then bidders will say they will pay over that amount, and then get thier own survey done? But they are not told what the value the owners were given?

OddFodd · 15/07/2014 20:19

It works in an entirely insane way Silverdaisy. You go to a couple of realtors and ask how much they think your house is worth. You choose one (generally the middle value if you are sensible) and then it's up to buyers to decide how much they'll offer - the figure the house is on the market for is just a ballpark number.

Once a seller has accepted an offer on their property, they can pull out right up until their solicitors have exchanged contracts. This means the buyers can have commissioned thousands of pounds worth of surveys etc. Equally, the buyer can pull out at any point until that stage.

So it's a shit system which benefits no one except for solicitors and surveyors.