Been gazundered!

[Polly2345]

We're due to exchange this week and our buyer has suddenly dropped their offer from £110,000 to £100,000. They're saying it's because the survey threw up issues around damp, the flat roof and the chimney. But they had the survey for several weeks before starting to seek quotes for this work, plus the new offer bears no relation to the quotes - the reduction she's proposing is almost twice what the quotes come to (not that she told us that to start with but our EA worked this out for us and we then asked to see the quotes).

Also, she was adamant she also needed an electrical survey but has never got one (saying she was struggling to find an electrician - even though our EA offered her the electrician they use for the lettings side of their business) and this morning changed her mind about needing one. I now suspect she never intended to get one but has used this to delay things til the last minute.

Our buyer's buyer is the bottom of the chain and has to complete by 24th March or their mortgage offer expires and they can't get it renewed. So I feel this is in our favour - if she sticks to her guns re her new offer and we tell her where to go then she doesn't just lose our house she also loses her buyer.

But we do really want the house we're buying and don't want to risk losing it. Although if we accepted her new stupidly low offer we wouldn't be able to buy our new house anyway.

What would others do?

Falaelings - I think our seller is being far too nice. We've offered to go halves on damp and offered no more. He's offered more than he should, but he's absolutely desperate not to have a third sale fall through.

We were gazundered by £40k! She cited general 'brexit' as her reason.
We declined, and went back on the market. We were in the lucky position that we had declined a large number of offers however, so had the comfort of knowing we would be ok and the risk wasn't great.

With gazundering at the last minute who knows what other tricks this buyer will get up to? (See the fable of the Turtle and the Scorpion).

You aren't responsible for what happens with your vendor, disappointing as it must be for him. You have to go with what's right for you and get a fair price for your property and I think the only way for you to achieve that is to cut the flaky buyer loose. If you're in a sellers market area I don't think your mortgage or selling price will be at risk.

Happened to me, about 2 days before completion.

I called her bluff and she backed down. However since I didn't actually need to sell it was a risk I was prepared to take. I was particularly put out because right after accepting her offer I'd had a slightly higher one, which I'd turned down because I'd given her my word.
What annoyed me even more was that the EA seemed to be taking her side and pressuring me to give in.

which I'd turned down because I'd given her my word
Yes, no good deed goes unpunished.

I can't believe there are so many people on here who have had buyers try and do this so close to exchange, it wouldn't even cross my mind to be so friggin underhand what tw*t bags!

What annoyed me even more was that the EA seemed to be taking her side and pressuring me to give in.
Because they would rather get 1.5% of e.g. £350k than 0% of £380k (for example)

I gazundered. Well, kind of. I renegotiated on price but we were still 2 months off exchange. Made my offer pre-bexit vote, the process dragged (vendor was extremely unresponsive, disn't sort solicitors etc) and the brexit vote happened. We were still no where near exchange and I renegotiated.

I have it on reasonable auth that the discounts sought in commercial property deals post brexit vote on pre-brexit vote agreements were 30% with most settling around 12-15%.

Anyway, if the vendor hadn't dragged we would have been nicely exchanged by the vote. With a long period between offer and exchange you do take the risk of the market moving against you (either up or down) and buyers/sellers looking to renegotiate.

I was prepared to walk away from the purchase if we hadn't renegotiated.

We've just offered £2k less that the full asking price of £185k we offered originally to account for damp works. Negotiations on the work have been going on since Christmas and my partner is sleeping on his parents sofa as his rental contract expired; does that mean we have gazundered and our behaviour was bad?!!

I find it hilarious that anyone would use "general Brexit" as as reason

The market is strong where it needs to be strong

User1471.... - it depends on timing and on what you're asking for and why. If, having made an offer, you get on with your survey in a timely fashion, and then ask for reductions for anything the survey considers urgent and important. And you make this ask soon after you get the survey rather than waiting until the day of exchange or v close to the day of exchange, then I would call it 'renegotiating', and that's considered acceptable. You do have to bear in mind that different people have different ideas about what constitutes urgent and impt. You'll see from this thread that some think a reduction for damp is reasonable and others think not - some see the risk of damp as part of owning a Victorian property. Also, there's mould dripping of the walls and then there's a much more subtle problem like ours which is perfectly livable with if you let the house breath (and weren't aware it needed redoing). So your seller might not fully agree with your demands. But I would class £2k off for damp, asked for well in advance of exchange, reasonable. Assuming you have quotes to back up the amount you're asking for.

When we bought the house we're now selling we had an electrical survey that highlighted the lighting wasn't earthed. We renegotiated and went halves with the sellers on getting it sorted. The work was done before they moved out so they knew we were actually spending the money on what we said we were. It was sctually also a condition of our motgage that it be done bevore completion - someyimes lenders insist on the urgent stuff. On the other hand, we didn't ask them to contribute to a new kitchen because the current one was old! Effectively I feel that's what our seller has done in asking us to pay for the new flat roof. If you buy an old house you accept there will be ongoing work.

You've gazundered if you wait til the last possible minute - when everyone in the chain has spent as much money as possible without everyone being committed. Then you start asking for random amounts off. Or you come up with a spurious reason such as Brexit. You're putting people in a very awkward position because they may have already booked removal vans or sorted their child's school place. You make it as deliberately awkward as possible. In our chain one person will have their mortgage offer expire before they can find another property if things fall through this late on the day. Our buyer knows this and clearly doesn't care.

Gazundering is illegal in many countries. We're a bit backwards in England.

We had a buyer try to drop offer by £25k 2 days before exchange. We simply responded that we'd put it back on the market if exchange didn't take place by 3.30pm on the Wednesday. She failed to exchange by deadline -we put it back on the market and got another offer on the Thursday for asking price which we let her know about She caved and exchanged on the Friday morning

Oh! It's so frustrating reading about people who held firm and hot them to cave. Beyond the damp reduction that's exactly what we planned to do and were doing (it went back on the market briefly on Tues). But our seller was obviously desperate.

Thanks so much, that was so helpful! We have been negotiating about the damp work for 9 weeks and made it clear we would not exchange without a resolution so hopefully we're in the clear!

Glad it helped. The only other thing I would add (and I don't think this applies with your damp thing) is that surveyors like to cover their backs. When we bought the house we're now selling the survey said the boiler was on its last legs and would last another year tops. We actually had it for another 10 years! It was old and inefficient and our gas bills definitely dropped when we replaced it, but to say it was on its last legs was just the surveyor covering their own back.

And damp surveys are usually done by damp companies - some will say work needs doing when it doesn't. Always worth getting more than one out.

Aargh! Well the revised mortgage offers have held everything up as some of you predicted. Our bank didn't send ours to our solicitor until late yesterday (I believe everyone else's bank did it earlier). And our solicitor still won't do the exchange because there's a clause (I presume a standard one) saying it will then take 7 days to move the money - and we don't have 7 days left before someone in the chain has their mortgage offer expire. Our bank have told our solicitor verbally that they'll transfer the funds in one working day but she's insisting on that in writing. I think she's doing the right thing but the bank are being so slow about everything. If we don't exchange today chances are the whole chain will fall apart, which will serve our buyer right, but won't get us moved!

FWIW I just did a remortgage, they said it would take 5 working days for the money, but did it in 3. Also, a friend recently moved and there was a mix up in requesting the funds and after lots of to-ing and fro-ing they managed to get them the same day, so it can be done.

This is just the worst behaviour. We had similar - drop in offer of £15k the day before exchange - again Brexit wobbles. We told him to get stuffed and got another offer that day. He came back and backed down, but we told him it wasn't his to buy anymore. It took us another 7 weeks to get to exchange with the new buyer, during which time gazunderer came back twice trying to get the deal back and we turned him down both times.

I really hope we taught him a lesson that this behaviour is unacceptable. Turns out he was desperate to buy our house (he ended up offering more than his original, unreduced, offer) and we were so happy to be able to tell him to fuck off because we didn't want to have any dealings with him anymore. I was seething when he did it.

We exchanged yesterday!

Yeah!!!! Great news especially for you and Mr Nice Seller.