Advice on private sale

[matblack72]

Hi Everyone

This is a long shot because our situation is unusual but has anyone here done a private sale without an estate agent?

We were approached by our buyers before we put the house on the market and agreed a price. This is now going to solicitors so everything is ready when they sell theirs.

My understanding is that at this point if I had an EA they would contact our buyers EA regularly to see how things were going and keep everyone in the loop.

We have our eyes on a house ourselves but obviously cant proceed until the chain builds under us, the EA for the house we want won't entertain an offer from us until our buyers have a buyer.

Should I just call our buyers EA and see how things are going? Is that the done thing?

Thanks

M

I can't see any harm in you calling the estate agent. They may or may not give you the information, but I would definitely explain the situation to them so they understand why you are calling. Failing that, they may require confirmation from your solicitor of your situation?

We sold our last place privately, but to first time buyers. Re the estate agents/your buyers selling I'd set a mental time limit and I'd first and foremost have a relationship with the buyers about what was happening. If I didn't quite trust them about whether it was really under offer etc I'd get a friend to call up and express interest in the property to the agents. I guess the agent has every incentive just to reassure you...

Re the rest of the process, it went absolutely fine, but what it did raise to us is the work that is done by the EA in chasing between both solicitors etc. Your solicitor may have sent document A, but did the other solicitor receive it? we had so many delays caused by this sort of confusion.

What I would suggest doing if this gets underway is agreeing weekly (or more or less often depending) email progress reports with your buyers, detailing all the actions you've taken and requesting any action from the buyers (my solicitor faxed x form today, could you check that your side received it?) so this doesn't happen and you get a sense of movement and commitment.

I gave them a call and they agreed that in circumstances where we were using an EA they would be probably call them once a week or so to see how the sale was progressing and they saw not issues with talking to me about the level of interest.

Unfortunately she also related that they had had one viewing booked but this was now cancelled :(

Their property only went on Rightmove on Tuesday so its early days but we're waiting for an offer on their so we can put an offer in on what we're interested in. So its now a waiting game.

M

Thanks Crazyhead

We have an ongoing email relationship with our buyers and I am 100% sure they are interest, they live just down the road and have admired our house for a while before that approached us asking if we'd considered selling (it just so happens we were looking to go to market this month anyway). They are a professional couple and we've met them twice now.

Oddly they decided to use the same solicitors as us to act on their behalf (different conveyencers to avoid conflict of interest), so flow of information should be good I hope.

This system drives me crazy, we now have to wait on them getting an offer to be taken seriously by the EA acting for the house we want to buy :(

It just takes time I suppose

M

It does take time and is IMMENSELY frustrating - but on the plus side, if it works out, it really does save money and in a way, dealing directly with the buyers is a real relief.