Do I buy this house or not *sex offender register*

[ToBuyOrNot67]

Hi everyone, I am a long time lurker and first time poster. Apologies if this is in the wrong section.

I find myself in a bit of an odd situation and I need to make a decision but could do with some advice.

To cut a long story short, I am in the process of moving home. I have a flat to sell and my DH and I are buying our first house together. We have just reached the point where contracts are almost ready to be exchanged but now, I am not sure whether to proceed.

Right from the beginning, the agent acting for the sellers (I'll call him Mr A) told us that a lady Mrs B owned the house, whenever we had queries, were negotiating the sale price etc Mr A always said he would speak with Mrs B and let us know etc.

Skip forward to yesterday and I receive the sales pack from my solicitor and this shows the owner is actually someone totally different - Mr C. There is no mention or Mrs B on any of the legal papers.

I find it quite odd that Mr A would deliberately mislead us. I mentioned it in passing to someone who said that Mr C's name rang a bell. After a very quick search on Google it turns out Mr C had been charged in December with 3 counts of child sex offenses - it mentions the road name but not the house number but it is safe to assume it is the same person that is selling this house. He pleaded not guilty and was released on bail until January. I have searched and can't find anything with any update on so not sure where this stands at the moment.

It also turns out that Mr A and Mr C are closely related.

I guess the reason I am posting is to try and establish what impact this may have on the address if this is eventually charged and added to the sex offenders register. I am not casting judgment on what he may or may not have done, I don't know the man, I don't the background. What I am concerned about is having the address linked to this. If he ends up on the register, will the address by listed, will it be public information. What I don't want to do is to go ahead with a sale and end up victim to any vigilante attack if they link the address but don't know he no longer lives there.

Sorry that was longer than I intended but I am really unsure of what the implications may be on me and my DH going forward if we go ahead.

Does anyone have any experience or knowledge in this area?

thanks in advance

We discovered after we had bought our house (in France so not sure if there is a register here) that the husband of the previous owner was a convicted paedophile who had spent two years in prison. It was a bit of a shock as we had briefly met him during viewings and he seemed perfectly normal (but of course what do we expect paedophiles to look like? Are they supposed to have a tattoo saying 'monster' on their forehead?) but other than that it made no difference to us. All the neighbours said they were very happy to see the back of the old owners!

I think your main problem is with the conduct of MrA and any conflict of interest he did not declare. As this is potentially a legal issue I would not be contacting MrA directly at all, but would express your concerns to your lawyer and see what he advises. You could try to use the whole thing as a negotiating tactic for a lower price.

Thank you all so much for taking the time to reply. DH and discussed it a lot night and have decided to speak with Mr A today to see what he has to say for himself before we make a decision.

Completely agree with those of you that have said to try for a reduction in price if we do proceed. Now that the initial shock and panic has worn off, my sensible head is telling me that it is unlikely to cause any future problems but the issue remains that Mr A has deliberately mislead us and that is making us wary.

I'll update you all.

thanks again

I would say thathe has misled you, and would anyone else, because he knows dam well a lot of people will be wary in the circs.

It doesn't mean however that he is likely to mislead about anything else.

There's no conflict of interest here. The estate agent acts in the seller's best interests, and being related isn't going to make any difference to that.

What would be a conflict of interest is if an estate agent were selling a house to a relative, since the duty to get the best deal for the seller would be in conflict with the interest in the relative buying the place cheaply.

But as a buyer, the estate agent wouldn't be looking after your interests anyway, so there's no problem.
Of course, you may still feel you don't trust them, but there's no reason to involve the OFT.

If MrC is MrA's father then the estate agent has a personal interest in the sale which he should have declared according to the rules linked to above. MrA seems to have been aware of this because of his misrepresentation of MrsB as the owner of the property.

The conflict doesn't come from MrC's alledged paedophilia, it comes from his relationship to MrA. The pending trial is irrelevant in this respect.

If in doubt walk away! Do yourself a favour.

Have you spoken to MrA OP?

Am quite curious to see how he tries to weasel his way out of this........

Is the Agency a member of the NAEA or other professional body? I don't know if their failure to notify you of the agent's relationship to the owner actually constitutes a conflict of interest, but it certainly seems like it would have been ethical to disclose it. (Although from their point of view, I can see why they wouldn't be keen to tell you.)

If I'd seen this prior to now I'd have said don't speak to Mr a at all till you have spoken to your solicitor.

I totally agree that they aren’t trustworthy. It’ll be better for you to search somewhere else! It’s not the only one chance! You can’t rely on your agent and that means he can be cheating you. If I were you I would simply go away and look through other offers but without this agent. Something is wrong here and if you don’t want to get into trouble keep searching.