To put complaint in against estate agent?

[Macanecheeseeee]

In the process of buying a property. It has been an absolute shambles from start to finish. I've purchased a house before so I know how stressful it can be but this is on a whole new level. EA has lied about certain issues and overall I'm just really disappointed by their attitude and the service. Problems that could have been avoided easily if they had done their job properly, having to ask them to do something multiple times before they got it right etc, you get the picture. It took 2 months just to get the paperwork sorted (everything was fine and ready to go on my end). My offer was excepted and then everything came to a standstill because the agents hadn't reported something beforehand (something that they should have reported when the property was put on the market). I have no idea what is going on or if the property is still even mine. I'm coming and going and just feel like I'm in limbo. Communication is extremely poor (well, it was ok when they needed something from me) but now they've messed up, I've not heard a peep from them.

I phoned the agent this morning and she said she would get back to me. I even explained how frustrating this whole process has been which she didn't even acknowledge or apologise for. I told her I was debating whether or not to withdraw my offer (they haven't had any other offers for the last 9 months, I wonder why). It is a fairly large branch with a complaints and feedback department. WIBU to phone them up and explain the situation? Or am I best off waiting until I (possibly) buy the property. I don't want things to be awkward with EA but also feel she should take responsibility for her error. When I've made a mistake in my job I've always been pulled up on it.

If it wasn't for the fact I love the property/location so much I probably would have pulled out by now.

Hi OP,
I think this is a non starter if the seller hasn’t gone through the correct process. They are supposed to offer the housing association first refusal to find a buyer first in a period of time (I think 6 or 8 weeks) so at the least you will need to be patient while this happens and don’t spend any more money on the buying process until it is sorted.

Are you hoping to buy 50% or 100%? As already stated by a previous poster if 50% you will have rent to pay. Your mortgage choices will be more limited than an ordinary purchase as not every lender accepts shared ownership.

Is there a service charge? Ground rent? Does it increase and if so by what formula? /lease? If so number of years remaining on the lease? You do need to know these things (not from the agent but the seller and housing association and verified by your solicitor. Your mortgage lender will also need to know this information.

I don't think the OP is still paying the full asking price. She has said her offer has now been reduced to reflect shared ownership.

OP the other thing to consider is the council will assess YOU to do a check on finances and can adjust the % offer based on that.

My friend put an offer on shared ownership at 50%. They did a finance test and decided they would only offer 30% ownership of the property. All very confusing but this may be the beginning of a lot of hoop jumping!

I do think YABU regards the EA though. You must assume that they weren't told this and therefore the blame sits firmly with the vendor.

You will have to apply to the HA to take on the tenancy, they will do credit checks etc. and you may have to meet certain criteria to be eligable. If I were you I would pull out..

[quote Clymene]@toconclude - can you explain how the estate agent is lacking basic professional competence?

They clearly believed the vendor owned the property, hence the listing price.

If anything I'd imagine that the vendor us in breach of contract with the estate agent.
[/quote]
This. The EA can only act in good faith on the information given by the vendor. This house should never have been brought to the open market at 100% of its market value, and without the involvement of the HA. This is where the whole issue stems from. The vendor probably has pound signs in their eyes and is trying hard to make the HA agree to this sale, and has come unstuck, hence the ridiculous delays.

And as I said earlier, the OPs solicitor bears some responsibility for not realising that their client clearly knows nothing about the house buying process and has therefore not clearly explained to her why this problem exists and what it is.

And as I also said, OP, you’d be better off walking away from this deal and buying something with more usual circumstances.

[quote Macanecheeseeee]@worriedatthemoment yes the property was advertised as the full value [/quote]
I wonder what the seller understands about the process tbh. If they were given the whole value, thinking they were getting the lot, they must be devastated to find it now drastically reduced.

It is really your solicitor that should have picked this up right from the start .

And yes the housing association have to agree to the valuation and the sale - plus I thought it also had to be advertised for sale for a certain amount of weeks as shared ownership before you could buy the whole freehold . Do you know if that has been done ?

I don’t understand why you’re buying a shared ownership house when it sounds like you could afford to just buy a house and own it all? I’ve heard they are a nightmare to sell and you’ll obviously have to pay rent as well.

I’d pull out if I were you.

Sorry OP estate agents are truly rubbish.

Get the seller’s details and ask them questions about the property as (at best) the agent’s job is limited to:
a) painting as rosy a picture of the property as possible to stir up a bidding war
b) selling it as quickly as possible to pocket their commission
c) making as much money as possible for themselves and maybe the seller.

They really don’t have much responsibility to the buyer and will be able to rely on any number of disclaimers to absolve themselves of any responsibility for inaccurate/incomplete info.

so are you paying to buy the whole property or a share ? did you have to get a mortgage as the lender would have noticed the position as well - it would have been obvious from the deeds

OP I think you should pull out of the sale. If you can afford 100% market value of a house then you would be mad to buy a 50% share and pay rent on the other half. You will as PPs have said restrict your available mortgage options, get more unfavourable terms, and ultimately end up paying more per month when you take rent on top of mortgage into account.

You are also tying yourself in to a system which could change in the future and leaving your selling options severely limited.

Shared ownership properties are very few and far between and HOs will likely have waiting lists of already vetted candidates waiting to purchase these, they are very unlikely to want to go through an independent agent and wait around for you to be approved by the scheme.

Have you even checked you are eligible? Normally you have to prove you cannot afford a property any other way, and you clearly can.

I really would just walk away, put in a complaint against the agents for any costs you have already paid out if you like, but going through with this purchase would be madness. I’m so sorry for your disappointment- it must be heartbreaking and so frustrating.

I think you need somehow to contact the seller directly. If you don't want to deal with their present estate agent, you could tell them that you are not willing to buy if they continue with them. Accepting this may mean you pull out of the sale.

If you do decide something like this, you need a very short time given for them to make up their mind.

As for the responsibilities and laws for estate agents, I recall Mr Blair's government backing down from regulation on the grounds it would reduce competition. In other words, there are too many spins and chancers who would be out of business.

I wonder what the seller understands about the process tbh. If they were given the whole value, thinking they were getting the lot, they must be devastated to find it now drastically reduced.

Well they'd know they only owned 50% of the property and had only paid say £75k instead of £150k so I'm baffled as to why they thought they could merrily slap a house on the market without telling the co-owning Housing Association.

Sounds like seller has misunderstood what shared ownership is and not told EA either, Possibly

Who else was I suppose to ask about the property?

The sellers?

OP. Estate agents are very often very unprofessional. The ones we dealt with were completely appalling. All this bullshit about you are not their customer is a pile of shit. They do have a responsibility to be honest.
www.tradingstandards.uk/media/documents/commercial/codes-of-practice/tpo-sales.pdf
This is the code of conduct. Check and see whether they have contravened this.

@Macanecheeseeee

It has absolutely nothing to do with the solicitor. Please listen. The EA was suppose to report and gain permission to sell the property when it was put up for sale 9 months ago. The EA did not do this. I put an offer in which was excepted to then be told it might not possibly go ahead as the EA did not request permission to sell. I have my mortgage in place, solicitor ready to begin proceedings and now we can't continue as we are having to wait for the EA to sort out this error, re-list the property, request permission to sell (which might possibly be refused)

Are you sure this isn't one of those lottery scams? You know, $2,00000000 waiting for you in a bank account in Lagos?

You should walk away from this op. You sound out of your depth.

OP*
Firstly, I was unaware that the property was on a shared ownership basis. This was never advertised and I thought I was buying the property outright. Once I was told (3 weeks later) I gave it some thought and decided to go ahead and put an offer in anyway as I loved the house and the location so much.

 There's your mistake. 

As soon as you were told about shared ownership you should have sought the advice of your own solicitor, who would have replied "Until we know who the owners are and have written confirmation both parties agree to the sale, there is no point making an offer. "

S/.he would also have told you, that without such confirmation, any offer and acceptance of it is invalid.

If you're this aggressive and arsey on an online forum I'm not surprised the estate agent gave you a wide berth .

Have you informed your mortgage provider that it is a shared ownership property? Some won't give you a mortgage or the conditions/٪ will be different.

As others have also pointed out - have you even been approved by the shared ownership scheme? In our area there are very strict criteria and you have to apply before even looking to purchase a property.

When I sold my shared ownership property, it was my responsibility to make sure I had permission to sell, and my buyer's solicitor checked I had this. TBH, the vendor should have made sure you knew. I did my own viewings and told people who viewed that this was the situation.

Forget about the EA issue for a minute, figure out whether you even want to go through with this? Doyou meet the HA criteria? There is a reason this has been on the market so long!! Do you know how much the rent is on the other 50% and service charge? Have you factored any of that into your calculations and your mortgage offer? Do you intend to love there forever and staircase (you might have to as it sounds like it's not going to sell on easily..)?
Forget about your EA complaint for now and just make sure you're not making a massive mistake. I would pull put personally. Why do SO when you were intending on buying a house in full and therefore can presumably afford it?

You pay your solicitor a very large fee to ask theses questions and advise you.

You should be angry at your solicitor. This is all incredibly confused. You really shouldn’t proceed until you fully understand shared ownership.

It is not at all difficult and requires no legal qualifications to check the ownership of a property and it only costs a few pounds. I was one of those hated things called at letting agent and before we marketed a property we showed due diligence by checking our client was the owner. Back when I was an estate agent same thing. Not sure why this eminently sensible step would not be taken nowadays.

Sorry for the long response. I have decided to withdraw my offer. I'm going to contact the EA tomorrow to let them know. I have also seen a property that has come up today which is lovely, cheaper (bought outright). I phoned the EA up to discuss and she was so helpful, had all the information to hand and has already said I can view the property tomorrow (I had to wait 2 weeks to view the other one as the vendor was so slow). The properties is also vacant as the sellers have already bought and moved out to somewhere else (lived there for 22 years). I have a good feeling about this one!