To tell gazunderer to do one?

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Selling a probate property, due to exchange and complete today. Agreed price was £20k less than asking/previous purchase price and included all furniture. Ours was the show home apartment, and another was put on the market which is empty, much smaller and in a less favourable, dark and dingy aspect at £20k lower than our agreed price 🙄 this flat is with an EA who persistently undervalues these properties which is why I did not use them.

Received a call from our Estate Agents yesterday. Buyer still wants our apartment but now wants to pay the same as the cheaper, crappier one or he'll withdraw and buy the other apartment. I am properly pissed, but offer £10k off to get it past the line.

Buyer is firm, £20k less or he'll walk.

I think the buyer is trying their luck, the other property was marketed in March. I've seen the buyer at the building whilst clearing out the property, I know they've been to look at the other flat long before this week and I suspected that he would try something like this at the last minute. I am also confident it's our flat he wants, just at the crap flat's price.

I've made them wait for my response, and having slept on it I am of the mind to hold firm on the £10k drop, requiring immediate exchange to stop him dicking about, or deal's off. If he walks, I will still have the property to remarket as well as all the furniture the buyer wanted included in the sale which will cover fees to date, and he'll have taken the competing property off the market.

AIBU to not reduce further and wish them luck with the other property if they withdraw, or do I suck up losing £20k?

Selling a property in England sucks.

@TooExtraImmatureCheddar Yes, concluding missives in Scotland is equivalent to exchanging contracts in England. Once that's done, the contract is binding on both parties

But, in Scotland, it appears more common for missives to be concluded ASAP, whilst in England it appears more common to exchange contracts at a later stage

The difference seems to be around practice / expectations, rather than procedure

I'd also say any more nonsense and I'm pulling out.

Cheeky fucker. !!

Well done OP 👏

Original agreed price or deal off, you know he doesn't really want the other flat so call his bluff.

I’m wondering about the character of these posters actually defending this man’s actions 🤔

Just tell him that's a pity and you hope he is very happy in the smaller, darker flat, and you are putting your flat back on the market today.

Yes, this. For all you know, he might be planning a multi-pronged playing-off approach: if you reduce yours by £20K, then he goes to the smaller flat and offers them £20K less than their asking, based on the fact that your bigger flat is (now) the same price as theirs; then they agree, he 'forgets' that your flat is bigger and nicer than theirs, so he uses the (new) agreed price of theirs to demand that you reduce yours by another £20K and so on.

It's despicable when people 'suddenly' discover a reason why they 'need to' reduce what they will pay, based on something that was abundantly evident from the start. Whom do they think they're fooling? Do they think that, if you're selling them your house in Rotherham, priced to the local market and purchase price agreed, they can demand a huge discount at the very last minute, as they've only just realised that it's not in Windsor?!

Thinking back to the other recent thread about the timewasters who make a hobby of asking to view houses that they have no interest in buying - sometimes spending ages there, measuring up, asking all kinds of pointless questions - it wouldn't surprise me if some of these fantasists take this further and actually put in an offer, letting the 'buying' process go as far as they can down the line, when they know all along that they're never going to actually go through with buying it. Truly nasty, playing with people's lives, but some folk really do get off on things like that and simply do not care about anybody else.

What a horrible thing to suggest!

You are messing abontanother seller who could lose a genuine buyer that way.

So you are planning to seek out a property where the seller ‘needs’ to conclude… and are going to attempt to manipulate them into accepting a lower offer at the last minute? F-ing unbelievable.

What you do depends on several factors,how much interest you’ve had on the apartment and what’s happening in the market you are in ,being top of that list. Its all too easy to take these things personally when buying/selling a property.
Let’s wait a minute and see things through his eyes. Interest rates went up just yesterday,prices are dropping in a great many areas and with this,likely to go into free fall. He may be a cash buyer but he maybe stands to lose a lot of money if his elderly parent dies soon after moving in and he then has to sell at a massive loss.
You are indignant at being messed about,but he made you an offer and you refused to take the house off the market ,which is usual and polite, meaning he was gambling waiting on the sale to go through ,so you don’t really have grounds for a hissy fit on that one ,he likely thinks you are the difficult party.
I live in an award winning village ( 2 awards)last summer houses were selling before they were listed ,and at highly inflated prices,today I see many very desirable houses languishing since last winter . I see prices daily being dropped by far in excess of 20k ,and we are in the north. The problem is that vendors and estate agents got greedy during the pandemic and now those chickens are coming home to roost and folk don’t want to budge,meanwhile buyers are extremely anxious about falling prices.
Are properties being snapped up where you are, have you had a lot of interest and how keen are you to shift the property? These are what you need to ask yourself and try to see the transaction in these terms only.
If you are in the south selling a flat for 400k and it’s a drop of 20k in an unstable market , from a cash buyer, I’d bite his bloody hand off. If you’re selling a flat for 60k in Lancashire and he wants 20k off, that’s a whole different matter.
Wishing you well in whatever you decide.

It's foul, isn't it?

No the wonder the English housing market has such a bad reputation,

The problem is no one wants to sign before they are certain the deal is worth it.

A lot of the time from offer to exchange is taken on things like searchs, surveys etc.

I thought the homebuyer pack was a good idea, because it removed some of the work done before exchange, but the government didn't seem to think so. I think some sort of nationalised organisation (so seller independent) that performs the survey/searches prior to sale would be a good idea. but my guess is that there is a massive VI from organisations like RICS who would then only be able to do one survey per sale rather than potentially multiple ones.

How do people get to sign missives so quickly in Scotland ? Is that because searches/surveys are performed by the seller ?

I feel very sorry for his tenants, in whichever property - he's giving off all the signs of a nightmare landlord who only sees the bottom line as it affects him and cares not a fig for how anything affects anybody else whatsoever.

@Lcb123 I think that's really shabby, TBH, but the system in England seems to allow it

If I were selling in England, I think I'd insist on exchanging contracts at an early stage, or alternatively, I would continue to market the property unless / until contracts were exchanged with a prospective buyer

I’m so glad we bought in Scotland. Their system isn’t perfect, but it allowed us to avoid despicable characters like this.

I bet it's not even for his mum!

Yes. Every seller must survey the property and provide a Home Valuation Report prior to it hitting the market. You can still get an independent survey done by making your offer subject to survey.

I bet it's not even for his mum!

Don't be so cynical, of course it is; he'll just need to advertise it so that she can come forward and then mum and son can both joyfully meet each other for the first time....

Absolutely!

Actually planning to pull this despicable trick - unbelievable!

The only way I would do anything like this was if my own buyer had shafted me in this way and I couldn't otherwise afford my next home and the chain would collapse - and even then I would feel ashamed for even suggesting it.

😂

How much do you care about anyone else to give them 20k of your money when you think don't have to ?

To me he gives off signs that he is an investor who wants the best return on his money and is willing to behave aggressively.

If you don't like this sort of person, probably not a good idea to accept an offer from an investor in the first place. Your agent should be able to provide the buyers background at the point of offer.

I would remarket but with a different agent, the current one is not working in the best interest of the OP.

Dont drop your price at all! What an absolute cheeky fucker!!! Tell him to do one. I guarantee he'll have a change of heart...

Call his bluff like another poster says. Don’t forget he’s invested money into your property…search fees, surveyors fees, he’ll have to pay these again on the crappier property if he drops out.
Don’t reduce it any more.

Do keep us posted OP

He has obviously heard it’s a probate property and thinks you will back down just to complete the deal. Tell him the 10k offer is off the table. There will another buyer along soon.