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Original poster

Grrr, am I being taken as a mug?

45 replies

Ladymuck · 12/01/2012 17:45

House came on the market last Thursday. We were one of 4 viewing on Sat. Put in first offer of 3% below asking price, which was rejected. Went back with offer of full asking price provided house taken off the market today, and Sale agreed board up be c.o.b tomorrow. Vendor is "interested", but needs to confer with family and will get back to me tomorrow. In the meantime there is another viewing tonight, and 3 more booked on Satruday.

We like the house and are prepared to pay asking price, but it feels as if we are being played?

OP posts:

charlieandlola · 12/01/2012 20:40

Ladymuck - is this your dream house, do you love it ? does it have "it" when you walk in ? does it have so many fantastic features you are sure you could not get elsewhere for a similar price ?

If yes to all 3, hang in there and keep your asking price offer on the table, whilst hedging your bets and looking around elsewhere.

If not, withdraw your full asking price offer as they have not met the terms of your offer and look elsewhere. I would guess they will be biting your hand off within a week or so, and will accept your original offer of 97% of the asking price.

Original poster

Ladymuck · 12/01/2012 20:45

No it's not my dream house. But it is in a very convenient location at a time in my life when I value convenience.

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charlieandlola · 12/01/2012 20:57

ok, but are you feeling the love - it is worth 3% of I guess more than £0.5m? How much is convenience worth to you?
That is the question.

your position is strong in the current market, please don't forget that.

Also, if there are "cousins" etc involved, how clear a line of authority do you have - who is selling the house, on behalf of whom, how long is the chain, it sounds a bit - "defensive" if you ask me, and I would be wary of putting any £ on the line here. Especially with such a crap estate agent acting for them.

londonlottie · 12/01/2012 23:13

If it was me I'd forget it. I'd be annoyed by the fob-offs and it would have put me off it. They need to talk to their nephew and cousin? WTF have they got to do with it?

I agree that an asking price is just a guide, but if you were told 'offer the asking and they'll take it off the market' and now they're dragging their heels... I'm afraid the magic would disappear for me at that point. There's a whole host of opportunity to come for the love to disappear between vendor and buyer ahead, if the pot's empty at this early stage... just think it would be a hideous transaction if it went ahead at all.

londonlottie · 12/01/2012 23:16

Crikey that was bad grammar

Original poster

Ladymuck · 12/01/2012 23:43

We want to move to this location. This is the second house we have tried to buy through this agent where we feel that we have been upfront, and in a strong position. I am starting to feel that I cannot work through this agent. We are known to all the local agents as being people who want to, and are able to, buy. Two other agents have leafleted roads for us, and call us as soon as they get to value a property that might suit us. We only knew this one was on the market when we saw it on Rightmove. Bear in mind that we have already offered on a similar property in the same road with the same agent at the same price in the last 2 months (and there have been very few sales of any description)... You'd think that it might have been worth a call?!

But yes lottie, I think you have it. If I can't trust the vendors at this stage, then the next few months are going to be miserable.

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maggiethecat · 12/01/2012 23:44

Keep a cool head. It's easy for things to get lost/misconstrued in translation.
I agree with other post about possibility of other viewings being scheduled in before your conditional offer. Vendor must consider who is going to be best purchaser for them in terms of the purchaser's financials, chain situation etc so I would give them until the weekend to see these other viewers.
If however, they come back talking about higher offers etc I would be very wary and then consider how much this means to you.

ChippingInLovesEasterEggs · 12/01/2012 23:50

Can't trust the vendors? Christ, all they said was 'we want to think about it - they haven't sold your first born on the black market! If anyone is to 'blame' it's the EA.

Original poster

Ladymuck · 13/01/2012 00:17

No, I asked them at what price would they take the house off the market today and then offered them that price in order to take it off the market today. They haven't. This EA is slow, the vendor is a teacher so only contactable in the evening so it takes at least 2 working days to make an offer and hear the outcome. Hence me trying to cut through the faff of increasing at £5k intervals.

It is a bit like a buy it now price on an eBay auction. I wanted their buy it now price, and to end the auction early (at probably a higher price than if I had waited). They now want to turn my buy it now offer into a bid.

Yes it is probably the EA at fault. But suddenly introducing a series of other relatives at 5pm doesn't fill me with confidence.

Still, the market still seems to be dropping, so we can look again in a few months.

OP posts:

maggiethecat · 13/01/2012 00:31

I hear what you say. However, you may not be be dealing with the savvy, cutthroat vendor that it is easy to perceive them to be. Give them the benefit of the doubt for now but make it very clear to the agents of what your expectations are.

ChippingInLovesEasterEggs · 13/01/2012 00:56

I can see why you are frustrated, but I honestly don't think you have the right to be pissed off with the vendors and accuse them of being untrustworthy.

You may have asked the how much - but that doesn't mean they aren't considering your circumstances - they might want to hold out for a cash buyer.

As I said before - if you need to blame someone, blame the EA. Who knows what they have told/asked the vendor?

PigletJohn · 13/01/2012 02:07

What's a house worth? What it will fetch.

It went up for sale at a price they thought would attract interest. If they had multiple viewings, and (at least) one offer at the asking price within a week, perhaps it was priced too low.

The seller is under no obligation to sell it to you at all, never mind at a price that is lower than he might get from someone else.

If there really is a lot of interest, the agent will probably (should) ask all interested parties to make their best offer, in writing, by a fixed date, probably within a couple of weeks, and will want to see evidence from prospective buyers that they have finance arranged, are not stuck in a chain, and are ready to go. The preferred buyer wil be the one that is most likely to be able to complete without changing their mind or having mortgage or chain problems, and offers a price that is towards the top of the range of offers. To strengthen your chances, prepare your case for making yourself that buyer.

Original poster

Ladymuck · 13/01/2012 07:23

We gave the EA our agreed mortgage offer today. Our EA received a bank statement from our purchaser today showing available funds and confirmed this with their EA. Other than indemnifying our purchaser's survey and getting that progressed there's not much else we can do.

Of course they don't have to accept our offer, or indeed any offer. Of course they can wait and see. I'm not unreasonable, I know that they want to continue viewings. But if they want to do that then the honest answer to the question "what offer would take the house off the market" is not "the asking price", as they said. They could have honestly said "we want the highest possible price and will wait until next week/month/year to get it". Currently pretty much no property is going for asking price, and the other house in the road has gone unsold for 6 months having dropped by 10%. Not sure that even if they accept our offer next week that we would want to proceed meanwhile waiting to see if we could get gazumped at any time just because the vendor feels that they could have got more.

Tbh if I'm annoyed at anyone, I'm annoyed at myself. I've bumped up the price by £50k unnecessarily.

OP posts:

londonlottie · 13/01/2012 09:19

It's easy to get caught up in a frenzy when you're the vendor and there appears to be a lot of interest in YOUR house, the place you've made what it is (in many cases), and I can understand that for some people it would affect what they do when an offer comes in that for other vendors would seem like a dream (ie. asking or close to asking).

I still think it's possible to act decently though. We had major panics when we put our offer in - later that day the EA revealed that there were two other offers on the table. Our vendors though - in my opinion - behaved very gracefully and decently and just asked all three of us to present our best offer, which they examined together with details as to everyone's relative buying status and that day made a decision about who to go with. As soon as we were aware there were other people making offers DH and I agreed that we would not countenance a bidding war and that if our offer (which was only 1.5% under the asking!) was rejected that would be the end of it.

Granted it's not the way everyone would have proceeded but I think it's the decent thing to do and meant once our offer was accepted there were no hard feelings going forwards. Which is essential once those surveys start rolling in and you have a whole new set of things to negotiate over!

maggiethecat · 13/01/2012 09:39

You've put it very well Lottie. I think it is easy for a vendor to get carried away when a lot of interest is being shown but I think that decency and being seen to be decent counts for a lot.

ChippingInLovesEasterEggs · 13/01/2012 10:33

They haven't met your criteria (taking it off of the market) - your offer is no longer 'on the table' if you don't want it to be. You have to decide if you want the property and if you do at what price, then tell them. After that you just have to leave it up to them to choose what to do. You clearly don't love this property, it's just 'convenient' - are you sure you want to go with 'convenient' at any price, let alone 50k over the price you wanted to pay.

mylovelymonster · 13/01/2012 16:26

Sounds like the agent was offering a deal he wasn't in the position to offer. Muppet. Sounds more like incompetence and not knowing how to negotiate and lead the process.
So, you've come up with what was asked of you, and they saying no? Maybe? They'll think about it? If the goalposts were set and now they're moving them, then that is plain unprofessional and I hope you tell them so. Have they got back to you with an actual answer/decision yet?

PigletJohn · 13/01/2012 16:48

Negotiation is a tough game, no doubt the agent will have had lots of practice at techniques to squeeze the highest price out of the buyers (and he is employed and paid by the vendors) so I guess you have to be tough too.

Good idea to say "our offer was subject to you taking the house off the market so it is now withdrawn." Don't know if it will make any difference though, as they now know that's what you're willing and able to pay.

I'm selling a house and the various buyers are naturally enough trying whatever techniques they can to squeeze the lowest price out of us.

Try not to take it personally.

newgirl · 13/01/2012 17:04

We've just exchanged and we were in perhaps a similar situation to the seller. We had much more interest than we expected and lots of offers. Our first offer was like yours below asking then full cash buyers. It had been on three days. Over the weekend more interest then on the tues everyone put in best and final. Three offers over asking price. In your position keep calm keep an open mind it's early days and you have shown a keen interest. They'd be mad not to give it the weekend too.

bibbitybobbityhat · 13/01/2012 17:08

Of course what could also have happened is that EA asked the vendor what offer he/she would accept, vendor say "full asking price", you offer full asking price within a day or two, EA goes back to vendor and says "great news, we've got a full asking price offer on your house from Ladymuck " and vendor says "oh really, but there's all this other interest and I want to discuss it with cousin Jimmy and auntie Mavis so I don't want to accept it just yet, I want to wait and see".

Because this sort of thing happens all the time but the EA always gets the blame. EA follows vendors instructions so if the EA is acting like a wanker, chances are the vendor is acting like a bigger one.

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