NIGHTMARE HOUSE SITUATION

[MummyToBeAgain1]

AIBU to be annoyed at estate agents!

I'm currently in the process of selling my current property - I recieved an offer at start of Jan and solicitors are doing they checks etc so hopefully it'll be sold within 10 weeks!

The issue is buying a property through an estate agent. My experience so far has showed that they want a cash buyer - no chain which leaves people in my situation at a loss.

A property was listed yesterday morning. We are interested and LOVE IT - literally the property that ticks all our boxes after over a year of looking.

I called the estate agents straight away to book a viewing. They noted my details and said that they are waiting for the vendor to confirm when people could view the property.

I called back after 2 hours and they had the same story, I called back at 4pm and the story was the same.

I called the estate agents again today at 9am - I was told the lady who was dealing with this house sale isn't in till 10am. I asked her what the reason was for the vendor to have listed the house but not sorted viewings. She said there are viewings and today is fully booked. I said I called yesterday and was told your trying to get in contact with the vendor. She then asked for my name and said your not on the list.

I said but that isn't fair because I called several times yesterday. I said during my second phone call I was told that you hadn't even recieved any other calls regarding this property yet. She muttered something.

She said well now you'll have to wait till next tuesday because they fully booked before then. I said but what if they accept an offer before then. She replied with 'Well, to be honest you don't even know if you're going to get it - because there's alot of interest for this property and cash buyers with no chain'.

She said the lady whose dealing with the sale of this property will call back at 10am.

At 9.40 I get a call which I missed. I called back and was cut of after 2 rings. I called again and it was the lady I spoke to earlier - she advised the lady who deals with the property has rang in sick and she'll book me in for next week.

I feel so deflated and already feel like there's no point viewing this house because I know the estate agents prioritise cash buyers.

Yeah, I get that it's a business and they want a good priced, quick sale. Obviously, with those of us who are in a chain - it takes time and there's that risk of the sale not going through or our mortgage not being accepted.

But what else are we meant to do? 😔 I genuinely feel like giving up today. By the way, this is one example from many. We initially put our property on market through estate agents from nov 2020 to aug 2021 - this was a nightmare situation and so much effort was wasted.
In december 2021 I put it up privately and managed to find a buyer with a good offer within 2 weeks.

I don't know how else to find a house. Or find one privately. I've checked facebook.

A colleague once said selling and buying a house is one of the most stressful situations people will experience in they lives. I honestly can not agree more! I've never been so stressed. I have young children and it will be difficult to drag them on rent till we buy a house and then drag them to the new house. It's unsettling and difficult.

Thanks for listening to my rant! AIBU to be annoyed that estate agents push those of us in a chain to the back of the queue.

03LaChanticleer

Yep I meant go into every estate agent that has listing in the area that you want to buy.

As you are selling privately, you don't have the advantage of someone advocating for you as a buyer. Nor do you have the advantage of being chain free.

So you need to work doubly hard to present yourself as a good option

We're in the same position as you.

It appears many buyers are either renting or living with friends/family, with everything put into storage, to enable them to be chain free.
It's not necessarily the estate agent's idea to only have cash/chain free viewings of a property
Many vendors don't relish the thought of 50+ viewings to be arranged over several days, so they cut it down to the cash or chain free buyers only (and there will still be plenty of those)
It's a crazy time right now with house buying/selling.
Even when we've managed to secure a viewing and put an offer in, we have been outbid by many £thousands
It's daunting and stressful, but don't give up.

I can feel the frustration and I totally sympathise but TBH you need to get used to this, it's the nature of supply/demand that if it's a property in demand the seller will be able to pick and choose from lots of different potential buyers, it's so, so annoying particularly if you are after something quite niche, around here it's 'fixer-upper' 3-4 bed family homes being sold off after someone's died or gone into care that are the ones that fly off the shelves, it's really tough because lots of young families can't afford a 'done' house and are prepared to take on the work etc to get a house that's in their budget but they are fishing in the same market as the developers that can buy in cash and proceed quickly so it's hard. EAs can be dicks like anyone else, don't get me wrong and sometimes are incompetent also so maybe that's what's happened here (maybe the person that took your call just forgot to add you in or whatever, it happens and then they lied to cover it up) but they fundamentally they can't magic properties from thin air, if this was a popular house (and sounds like it was very much so) and the vendor didn't want more than say 5 viewings and within 24 hours they were able to fill those slots with pre-vetted cash buyers then I can see why they fobbed you off, sorry.

It might help a bit if you wait until after yours has sold and move into rented to be chain-free but TBH you'll still need a mortgage so to be honest I would just be persistent, when buying in a seller's market I've always found it to be a numbers game, the more you enquire about/view/offer on the likelier you are to find 'the one', you can't get attached to any one property as it's so unlikely you'll get it, you just need to call up about anything remotely suitable the second it's on the market, get yourself onto agent's lists, be super polite and flexible with the agents so they like you, agree to viewings whenever suits the seller etc. and if one falls through for no good reason, take it on the chin and move on. If you can't find enough houses to view then you are probably going to need to either be very patient or broaden your search criteria, consider something smaller or in a different area...?

OP, I agree it's shit. In your position, I think I'd have 3 plans on the go:
Plan A - contact the EA again asking to be put on the list to view. Remind them that your sale is going through.
Plan B - ask same (and other local) EA about rental properties as you are about to exchange on your sale and are looking to buy. That pushes you up the priority list. I know you don't want to go into rented, but it may be a means to an end.
Plan C - type up something and print it out stating that you have sold your property and are looking for somewhere in the area. You are a young family keen to stay local blah blah. Get a cheap mobile/SIM and or a throwaway email address and use those details. Print it out and put them through all the doors of any house locally that might be of interest but NOT the one up with the EA. You could make the point that selling privately would save the vendors money. At the worst, it costs you a SIM card, paper, ink and legwork.

My son was a first time buyer with 10 percent deposit. He rang up the moment houses came on the market but often was told they had 10 viewing booked so would wait for those offers to come in before any more viewings. Also he did view 3 houses and made an offer for full asking price on 2 of them but was always told house sold for well over asking price. In the end he had to offer £4.5k over asking price to get offer accepted. BS valuer valued it down £5.5k pounds so eventually he was forced to tell EA either vendor agreed to accept BS valuation or he would have to pull out. BS valuable was accepted and he is now living in house since October. In return he agreed to fit in with the pave of the vendor, which was very slow.

I'm so curious now about the house that I want to see it. Do you have a real estate listing/ad you'd be willing to share?

We live in an area where it is not possible to buy if you are in a chain. There are always enough potential buyers who are chain free. We were actually beaten to some properties by people who were actual cash buyers with no mortgage! So they trumped anyone else interested.

People get around it by selling and renting for a while before they buy. It is a lot of hassle and tricky to coordinate the dates for getting out of the rental.

@MummyToBeAgain1

Estate agents definitely have 'favourites'. I agree 100%.

They reason they didn't arrange a viewing with me yesterday was because they already had in mind who they would be prioritising not because I had rang twice. I didn't pestor them - I politely asked if there was an update on viewings - it was a simple yes or no.

From my conversations with them I can sense that there's something not right. The house was listed and I called them within 5 minutes to book a viewing. They lie and can't keep up with they lies.

As a poster mentioned that sometimes they try to sell it to a family/friend - this is exactly what came to my mind first thing.

Sometimes they do have ‘favourites’, but it’s often for a valid reason.

They probably prioritise potential buyers that are also selling through them, people who have had purchases through them fall through before, or people who they’ve already met and whose buying position they like.

They can probably get bookings for viewings before a property goes online from people that are already on their books, so it doesn’t automatically mean they are lying just because you couldn’t get in the first round of viewings.

People seem to forget that estate agents don’t work for buyers, they work for sellers. As long as the vendor is happy that the EA are getting them good enough offers, then whatever else they do doesn’t really matter.

[quote MummyToBeAgain1]@WulyJmpr

The people who are buying our property are not in a chain. So, it's a pretty straightforward sale. Fingers crossed!

Yes, they did which is why I'm so annoyed.[/quote]
the vendor decides who views, not the EA. I was stopped from seeing a house that ticked all my boxes because they would only allow viewing from people who already had an offer on theirs. In the end the house I got is much better suited to my needs.

And tbh, you are not necessarily in a brilliant position. My buyer was in your position, they had a cash buyer so the (short) chain looked to be unproblematic - but in the end the cash buyer was a huge CF. All sorts of messing around my buyer, asking for work to be done before exchange, and THEN the day before exchange demanding a 5% price reduction or the sale was off.

@UsernameNotAvailableHmm

We're in the same position as you. It appears many buyers are either renting or living with friends/family, with everything put into storage, to enable them to be chain free. It's not necessarily the estate agent's idea to only have cash/chain free viewings of a property Many vendors don't relish the thought of 50+ viewings to be arranged over several days, so they cut it down to the cash or chain free buyers only (and there will still be plenty of those) It's a crazy time right now with house buying/selling. Even when we've managed to secure a viewing and put an offer in, we have been outbid by many £thousands It's daunting and stressful, but don't give up.

That’s our plan for that very reason. When we bought our current home, we were actually outbid by £20k. The estate agent tried to get us to enter into a bidding war but we didn’t budge and stressed we’re chain free. The vendor went with us because we weren’t in a chain (he was making a huge profit anyway so £20k was pocket money for him).

We plan to move soon, but will sell first, and then rent so that again, we’re not in a chain. We have friends who found their dream home but couldn’t get buyers for their home, so they ended up losing it. We don’t want to be in that situation!

Also you could make sure all local EA have your details and ask them to send you sneak preview houses. You get to see them before they are listed so can set up early viewing.

It takes days if not weeks to get a house listed. In reality the viewings will be booked (on our area they are often sold) before it ever pops up on rightmove or zoopla (zoopla is before right move often)

You need to build relationships with estate agents.

Does the house need doing up? Is it going cheap. I’ve personally been looking in West Yorkshire also and I’ve found estate agents are pushing and pushing property developers to the front of the queue so they will get the sell again a few weeks later when it’s been done up

Property developers who are going to sell again in “ a few weeks” will usually sell at auction. If it does go back on the market that quickly it will be sold to a cash buyer, as it’s hard to get mortgage on a property that someone else bought for a lot less money within the last 6 months.

You need to be on the books of every agent in your area. If they know you're a serious buyer they will offer you the off market stuff and early doors on the ones coming to market.

I would say the vendor has made it clear they don't want to interact with buyers, so pushing crap through the door would bring about my rage.

Also, not having an EA yourself you're could be missing out on the early notifications of properties. My EA has a list of buyers who got to see the listing 24 hrs before it went live on Rightmove, a lot are their own customers who are selling through them too. I think you need to get on those mailing lists and try and get some good relationships going.

Also the letter through the door thing - yes to houses on a certain street I think works. 'If you're thinking of selling we'd love to talk to you'. But pestering this vendor won't get you anywhere.

I chose to go with an EA so they can deal with all this shit for me!

Also, it's not a given people want cash buyers. At one point we thought we might go for a chain buyer as we needed to buy some time, but then things changed and we were happy to move a little quicker. It's just luck and some effort on your part.

@I0NA

Does the house need doing up? Is it going cheap. I’ve personally been looking in West Yorkshire also and I’ve found estate agents are pushing and pushing property developers to the front of the queue so they will get the sell again a few weeks later when it’s been done up

Property developers who are going to sell again in “ a few weeks” will usually sell at auction. If it does go back on the market that quickly it will be sold to a cash buyer, as it’s hard to get mortgage on a property that someone else bought for a lot less money within the last 6 months.

They are sold at auction and on the market. Especially in certain parts of Yorkshire. It’s a horrible time at the minute. I’ve looked at 4 like that and would have no issues getting a mortgage. It’s sellers market currently

Those of you who have been through this process. How difficult is it? Or, am I just overthinking and it's not so bad.

We put our flat on the market in Aug 2020, accepted an a offer a few weeks later and had an offer accepted on a house a couple of weeks after that. Then the market went nuts. The people we were buying from couldn't find anything and eventually pulled out, we went ahead with our sale and moved into rented. We then embarked on 8 months of over 50 viewings, most of which were an estate agent stationed at that house for 2 days solid whilst buyers came every 10 mins and offers went way over the asking price (many times they weren't event estate agents, just a person hired for the day by the agency to stand there whilst buyers looked round) we made 8 offers all way over asking, 4 were accepted but vendors pulled out of 3 after issues finding onward purchases, the last one the vendors moved into rented so they could be the chain free cash buyers. No point registering with agents or notes through the door (I'd never do that anyway) because there are literally queues of buyers to view.

All sounds very depressing except of course that our new house is magnificent and worth all the arsing about (as it was the purchase of this house only took 8 weeks from offer to being ready to complete due to both parties removing any element of chain). Moving into rented took all the stress out of it too, if you can do that it's worth it as it puts you in a much better position and it's easier to brush it off when things don't go your way. Keep the faith, you'll get there!

Also, I say also a lot.

Also, not having an EA yourself you're could be missing out on the early notifications of properties.

She doesn't need an EA herself for that, she just rings every agent in the area and registers with them. She just needs to be on their books as looking.

@TatianaBis

Also, not having an EA yourself you're could be missing out on the early notifications of properties.

She doesn't need an EA herself for that, she just rings every agent in the area and registers with them. She just needs to be on their books as looking.

You're right, I was just thinking of how our EA was looking after some of their vendors too and getting them into viewings. It is in their interest to keep the sale moving.

It's a right kerfuffle!

We've just sold our house, we ended up going for the highest bidder which was a couple of first time buyers. It's still taken 5 months even though they're not in a chain and we are buyer a new build. Mortgages are taking ages to get approved at the moment.
We are moving next week but I've had a solid couple of weeks where I've had to chase solicitors, surveys and estate agents. I'm exhausted but relieved as I'm due in March!

The house is a 3 bedroom good sized family house with a very good sized garden! The area is fantastic with a good community spirit (I have a friend who lives around there so it was easy finding out what the area was like. It's certainly priced below what it's worth, I'm not sure why that is!

Thank you so much for your advice and support - every single person who has posted. Honestly, I might sound like some crazy lady from my initial post - but I honestly am not. I think today everything just felt impossible - and after posting here I genuinely feel so much better and more optimistic.
I have a DH who has a certain disability because of which I'm responsible for pretty much all the day to day household stuff, finances, appointments etc. I have a part time job and 3 under 6s, the youngest os currently teething so has been difficult.

My next step is to either email or visit all the agents in the areas I'm finding a house and build a relationship with them.

And accept that the likelihood of going on rent first is pretty high! Take each day as it comes as a poster mentioned.

I would have a EA if I was selling through them right? I'm selling privately so the most I can do is contact EAs to tell them what I'm interested in.

You may have called straight away but it sounds like other people got in there first.

Houses were selling very quickly when we bought ours. We’d call to view to be told they had already sold. Over and over again, We only got our house because we happened to see it literally as soon as it was listed and we put an offer in straight away too.