Pulling out of house purchase last minute

[nachosTrafficante]

We’re about to pull out of a house sale...due to basically changing out minds. I feel awful especially for our buyer who has been waiting for us to fins somewhere and has just had survey down. I want to offer to pay for his survey as I feel dreadful.

Well then have survey I suppose.

So to all those posters saying it’s immoral:

As I said upthread a buyer of mine (years ago) withdrew from buying my flat due to his redundancy. Acceptable or not? Annoying certainly but who for, me or him?

My seller who was taken Ill after exchanging contracts. Had it been before exchange I’m pretty certain they’d have pulled out & in the circumstances I wouldn’t have blamed them. Again annoying for them or me?

Sometimes it’s not so clear cut although May not be the case here.

Buying a house is a massive commitment ...the biggest financial one most people make. It's not great to back out late in the process but if you are having second thoughts what else can you do ...make a 25 year mortgage commitment you don't want because the sellers will be disappointed/angry if you don't? Put it down to experience op and make sure you are definitely up for it before you make your next offer. Pulling out at the last minute does not make you a bad person just one who has made a mistake which unfortunately also impacts hugely on the seller.

This happened to us at the beginning of the year. Sellers simply changed their minds and apparently we were supposed to feel sorry for them because they’d been having sleepless nights about the decision. It cost us about £10k after factoring in solicitors, survey, storage fees and the cost of an extra move because we had to move into temporary accommodation and let our own sale proceed or we’d have lost our own buyers.

Same thing happened to DH and me a few weeks ago, the vendor pulled out on the day of exchange after demanding more money, and now I’m 34 weeks pregnant and DH and I are currently living with his parents. I spend my sleepless nights imagining the numerous and varying ills that I hope befall that man.

I’ve got a whole thread about it here OP, if you feel like reading about the consequences of dick moves actions like yours.

This is one reason I like Australia - you can’t pull out as contracts are signed immediately. You make an offer, it’s accepted, both vendor and buyer will sign contract at agreed price within 24hrs of offer. Once both have signed contract, each party has 48 hrs cooling off - this is when you get your survey done, check your loan approval (if required) - and either party can withdraw in this 48 hrs with no issues/penalty etc. Once these 48 hrs have passed (unless you have a clause subject to finance etc), the deal is locked in and settlement (change of ownership) occurs 30 days later (that’s usual, you can negotiate for longer, but most are 30 to 60 days). This situation means you need to be committed to moving before you go up for sale. There are (very, very rarely) no chains, and you can’t just have a buyer waiting for you to finally find a house to move into. People normally move out before settlement date and the new owner will normally move in anytime after settlemt (not like all the threads on here where new owners are arriving to a home where the vendors are still living 🤦‍♀️).

It is also normal to feel like moving isn’t the right thing once you have signed contracts, as I think uncertainty strikes as the move becomes “real”, rather than excited at looking at new homes. You and your husband need to have a proper discussion on whether you wish to move or not ASAP and then let your agent/solicitor know if you are not proceeding. Be aware that if you then change your mind again in the next few months and do decide to sell, that any potential buyers hearing that you’ve pulled out once before, will likely walk away from your property.

@ScotsinOz

That sounds like a great system

As others have said it's a shitty thing to do.

Having just been through a house move I can only imagine how I would have felt it our buyers had pulled out.

But, if you would regret it if you went ahead then pull out. No one should continue because it's easier. Moving home is not cheap, it's not like you can just sell on without losing anything. (Thoughts that crossed my mind as I wasnt 100% behind our decision - I wasn't pressured by dh. I'm just indecisive and didn't dislike our old house.) But just be sure next time you make an offer that you actually want the property.

What are your reasons for pulling out? Is it that you just don't like what you have found so far because that's not their fault. Could you not move into rented accommodation until you do find something you want to commit to? Hopefully they are not in a big chain.

Same thing happened to DH and me a few weeks ago, the vendor pulled out on the day of exchange after demanding more money, and now I’m 34 weeks pregnant and DH and I are currently living with his parents.

What the vendor did was really shitty, the same thing happened to me. However I don't understand why the fact your nearly due & living with your in-laws is the fault of the vendor. Another poster upthread mentioned how long their house was on the market before they finally got an offer that was then withdrawn. Why is it a potential buyers fault how long a property is on the market for?

@eeksville not sure if it was my post you are referring to re length of time it was on the market but if so we actually had 2 people pull out although the first had no choice as her buyers dumped her in it. It isnt anyone else's fault our house was on so long but what I was getting at was that you dont know what people have gone through to get to that stage. Not your problem I guess but it's not just a case of 'oh well, they will get over it', it can be devastating.

@GotToGoMyOwnWay those are 2 totally different situations though, a friend lost their house due to the husband of the sellers coming down with cancer. Yes it was crap for them but no it wasn't a shit thing for the others to do, it wasnt a case of them just changing their mind, it wasn't just plain selfish thoughlessnes. The OP already mentioned her sh has had doubts for a while so I doubt the situation is the same!

*dh not sh!

We had this done to us, once. Tossers then put themselves back on the market at a higher price. We bought a better house for less in a nicer location in the meantime, though.

It's not ideal but I certainly don't think you're an awful person. At the end of the day it's a business decision not a personal one and a lot of money at that. You have to do what's right for you.

The OP is getting unfairly vilified here. Some posters seem to be suggesting that even if the OP is having doubts, they should go through with a purchase of hundreds of thousands of pounds just to avoid offending a person they don’t even know!

It’s not an ideal situation OP, but far preferable to pull out now than spend the next decade stuck in a house you don’t like.

Happened to us, it's terrible, not helped by the lies from the estate agent ... different reasons as to why the chain collapsed but it left me never wanting to move

The OP is getting unfairly vilified here. Some posters seem to be suggesting that even if the OP is having doubts, they should go through with a purchase of hundreds of thousands of pounds just to avoid offending a person they don’t even know!

It's probably more the four-figure sum of money and significant length of time and emotional energy that OP has cost said person she doesn't know, that they will have absolutely nothing to show for, that people are vilifying her for than the 'offence'. By the way, it's a sale she's pulling out of, not a purchase, which makes her shit behaviour even easier to avoid if she were so inclined.

If the OP is having doubts she should have grown the fuck up and had them before she agreed a sale. The OP is legally allowed to do this, other people are very much allowed to think and say that she's a piece of shit for it (and even more so when she posts about it on a gigantic internet chat forum).

If you have simply changed your minds then you are twats.

My buyer pulled out, after wanting to drop his offer by 6% for no bloody reason, and has cost me untold stress and thousands of pounds I don't have.

ScotsinOz It does sound like a less stressful system altogether. But how does it work with people buying and selling together? It sounds like you either need to be lucky enough to find a buyer and have an offer accepted yourselves in the same 24 hour period or you must have a ton of people moving into short-term renting all the time.

So what has changed your / dh mind at the late stage?

Appalling behaviour. Make sure you compensate your buyers for every penny of their financial losses. It still won’t compensate them for the stress and anguish you’ll be putting them through, but at least you two will get to carry some real consequences from your awful behaviour.

And while we’re on the subject, I would never want to be with somebody who was prepared to treat other people this way. If they’ll happily shaft others, they’ll shaft you when the time comes. Just a thought.

It is a shitty thing to do, but you are pulling out at the right stage of the process (if there is one). My buyer fell out on day of completion! We had to find somewhere to stay with 2 very young children, we were in a new town, had to put all our stuff in storage and hang around for a week to see If the move was going to happen. The entire chain was affected by this. He only compensated us for some of the lost costs and now we are having to sue for the rest - legal fees, removal costs, storage, interest on mortgage, airbnbs. The sale went through in the end (a month later), but had it not, he would have owed everyone in the chain their deposits. So yeah, best to change your mind early on.

sure if it was my post you are referring to re length of time it was on the market but if so we actually had 2 people pull out although the first had no choice as her buyers dumped her in it. It isnt anyone else's fault our house was on so long but what I was getting at was that you dont know what people have gone through to get to that stage

Likewise can't you say that about your potential buyers though?

I would never want to be with somebody who was prepared to treat other people this way. If they’ll happily shaft others, they’ll shaft you when the time comes.

One of my neighbours pulled out of a house purchase because of Brexit jitters. He is a paediatric surgeon not Lucifer.

Some people are being completely ridiculous on this thread. OP pull out if you need to. Buying & selling houses are stressful. Sometimes you need to do what’s right for you not a random stranger.

How many people on here would accept another higher offer (say 10k plus) after agreeing to sell to another buyer (who has spent money on fees/surveys)? It's not as common in London as it was once but it still happens a lot so I will always do what's right for me. Having said that I've never pulled out of a sale but who knows I may do in the future.

Nobody’s saying it’s illegal. It should be though because it’s absolutely shit. Anyone who can waste thousands of pounds of someone else’s money without a flicker of concern is morally lacking.

But OP has shown concern, to the extent that she wants to refund their survey fee. Save your moral opprobrium for the right targets.