Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to throw bricks through the windows of our estate agent?

113 replies

Jellyontheham · 28/04/2015 12:54

Or firebomb them?Angry

OP posts:
mistlethrush · 28/04/2015 12:56

Yes, you would be arrested.

However, sharing what they are doing and naming and shaming if appropriate would be completely different Grin

FarFromAnyRoad · 28/04/2015 12:56

Well that'll certainly take care of where to live for the next five years or so as you'll be cooling your arse at Her Majesty's Pleasure!

Psipsina · 28/04/2015 12:57

Er, we don't know. More detail might help?

Original poster
Jellyontheham · 28/04/2015 13:05

Our house. Ver naice estate house on ver naice commuter estate in Home Counties. Fully newly refurbished, valued at £575k by 3 agents.

We saw the only house we have said we would move for, and so are selling ONLY for this house. The house is on with agent F, we are selling through their sister company next door, J. (F deal with posher and rural stuff, J is more urban, but they share sales support and are essentially the same company.)

We offer on the house we like. Offer accepted subject to survey - likely to be issues, it's a wreck and has been on the market with F for 16 months...

We put ours on market at £550 to get a quick sale. Accept offer at £537 and encouraged to remove outs from the market as our buyer, MrsM, is also selling through F, and if this chain completes, they get all 3 fees. We agree, so long as the house we are buying, from MrsA, is also removed from sale.

So far so good. But then MrsM takes AGES to sell hers. We ask to go back to active marketing. Our agent agrees but then secretly refuses to allow new viewings on ours, actively dissuading people by saying its "nearly sold."Angry (Got friends to phone to try and arrange viewings).

Finally get a call today: MrsM has sold but for far less than she was hoping so her offer is now £525, but her buyer is cash, so it's procedable.

I'm fuming. We could have bloody well sold at £525 a dozen times over, weeks ago.
And the agent's fee for this? £6000. Angry

Pass me a slingshot. I'm going in.

OP posts:
Psipsina · 28/04/2015 13:08

yeh chuck the bricks.

Let us know how you get on, they're a bunch of wankers

Original poster
Jellyontheham · 28/04/2015 13:09

I've eaten three jam tarts in anger. That'll show the fuckers. Angry

OP posts:
FarFromAnyRoad · 28/04/2015 13:13

Justifiable tarticide in that case. You would also get off any charge on the grounds of extreme provocation. I've yet to meet an Estate Agency that operates within the bounds of decency that bind the rest of us. If you know so surely what you want could you do it without them?

FarFromAnyRoad · 28/04/2015 13:14

And I'd be sorely tempted to invite Mrs M to take a long low flying fuck at herself too. Is that possible?

Original poster
Jellyontheham · 28/04/2015 13:16

Dunno. I'm going to have to do something. I just rang my husband in work and said ive had a row with the estate agents and might have used the fuck-word to them, and he laughed but then said we should go dual agency. Can agents F balls up the sale of the house we want though?

OP posts:
blue42 · 28/04/2015 13:16

I'm always at a loss to understand what exactly estate agents do for their money. As far as I can see they are a parasitic aspect on the whole process, and only get away with it because most of us think it's too much hassle to do ourselves.

One of these days I think we'll see a shift in seller behaviour, and a development of the corresponding marketing infrastructure to support direct marketing. Then, thank god, shitty, half-witted estate agents will be a thing of the past.

May be wrong, but I dream of that day all the same.

Original poster
Jellyontheham · 28/04/2015 13:19

MrsM appeared to be a Very Nice a Lady but with an overpriced house.
We had said originally that our figures only stacked up at a sale of £525 but we took it off the market based on her offer of £537.

I wish we had gone with the other agents at £575 and not been swayed by their "oh it's much easier to proceed if you buy and sell through the one company."
It's crap, it's just easier for them to shaft everyone.

OP posts:
Original poster
Jellyontheham · 28/04/2015 13:26

So is dual agency the way forward?

OP posts:
waxweasel · 28/04/2015 13:30

Would you lob a couple of bricks at our estate agent too?

Am having similar drama - too stressed to actually type it all out. But I am beyond furious at the lying, deceitful, inept little parasites I am forced to deal with...and who will be rewarded handsomely for being utter twats who've done nothing but fuck up and ruin everything they possibly could!

Fleecyleesy · 28/04/2015 13:30

Mrs M can fuck off moving the price down by £12k after you've agreed it.

I'd just say to the agent, no £537k is what we agreed, we will not be robbed of £12k.

Estate agents should be eliminated. So many are sleazy liars, messing with people's lives. They say anything to get their commission. We should have professional valuers who have a professional qualification and belong to a professional body with a code of conduct and ethics. Leave the rest to solicitors.

DownWithThisTypeOfThing · 28/04/2015 13:43

The agents only get their fee if you sell don't they?
if you make it clear £537k is as low as you will go they'll either have to persuade MrsM to up her offer or find you another buyer. If they fail to do either you can go with another agent can't you?

LadyTmalia · 28/04/2015 13:51

Im so sorry what you are going through but

I've eaten three jam tarts in anger. That'll show the fuckers

I may have woken up the neighbour across the street baby from laughing so loud :D

I do hope you get it sorted soon.

manchestermummy · 28/04/2015 13:52

Dual agency, definitely.

When we last moved, the vendor's estate agent started a rumour that our buyer was unable to get a mortgage. It was absolute nonsense. The buyer had had a problem caused by not being British and not being able to supply a British passport and some stage in the process, but that had been ironed out (and indeed he and his wife where very open about what had happened).

Everyone believed the estate agent. The whole chain very nearly collapsed. Our own estate agent contacted them and told them not to be so unprofessional, and remind them that slander isn't very nice.

Another local estate agent told us there were "many, many problems" with our house, we'd never get anywhere near asking, and he would find it difficult to support us if we didn't go with his (bordering on offensive) valuation. Oddly, we didn't instruct him. Ended up selling within three days just shy of the asking price. They had a portfolio of rental properties and quite by coincidence by friend was looking at one of them a couple of weeks later after her estate agent had messed up and they couldn't yet move into their new home. Problematic estate agent wasted no time in telling her how we were "unrealistic", "naïve", "thought too much of our home", we "made a mistake not instructing him" and should be prepared to have our house on the market for a very long time. Friend had great delight in telling him that it was already sold...

mistlethrush · 28/04/2015 13:54

That happened to my parents when we were moving when I was a child - except our buyer decided that, as their home had to be reduced in price with the same agents, ours must be overpriced too and reduced the offer, the week before the arranged moving date. So 6 new buyers were shown around the house that weekend, strewn as it was with tea chests, and the house sold for the original asking price that weekend (in fact 3 buyers all came in on that price and the 'most likely to complete' was chosen).

So put it back on the market and get the price you wanted!

PhoebeMcPeePee · 28/04/2015 13:59

I wouldn't waste your time or effort getting arsy but I would get on the phone and say
"thank for the offer MrsM Grin. If our super agents can get £12k off the house we're buying (or collectively cut their fees to save us the £12k Wink) we'd be deluded to proceed otherwise no can do as we don't have a spare £12k sloshing around in our account. Byeeee"

PhoebeMcPeePee · 28/04/2015 14:00

*delighted to proceed not deluded Smile

BuzzardBird · 28/04/2015 14:06

YABU for eating jam tarts, you should have eaten 3 lemon curd tarts and smeared the other three across their windows.

I would pull out personally, or threaten to and see how they react to that.

Coffeethrowtrampbitch · 28/04/2015 14:18

What Phoebe said.

That is really shocking. I live in Scotland so no changing the price, if you offer you must pay that price and the buyer must sell to you. It isn't always the best, especially if you get a low offer and accept, but it is miles better than getting an acceptable offer which is then weaselled out of!

NickyEds · 28/04/2015 14:24

Well that'll certainly take care of where to live for the next five years or so as you'll be cooling your arse at Her Majesty's Pleasure!

No jury of your peers would convict you. At least not one who has ever had to deal with an estate agent. I reserve my jam tarts for lettings agents but given that some are both......

HelenF350 · 28/04/2015 14:26

Mine sat and told me how they'd told a potential buyer who had booked a viewing that our flat wasn't suitable for them as there were too many stairs for a young family?? Surely the couples decision, not for my estate agent who is being paid to sell the property to decide. I will never use the useless tw@ts again.

drbonnieblossman · 28/04/2015 14:27

Call Mrs M's bluff.

As to dual agency, good idea but if you signed a sole agency contract with your agent, you need to wait for this to terminate.

Swipe left for the next trending thread