Why don't we use a better system of selling houses? Third time SSC

[InkedGreen]

Just about every country including Scotland has a far better way of selling a house. It wouldn't be that much to just implement something to make it all much smoother. Like have a survey done before it goes up for sale and then make a non refundable deposit to secure it.

Why do we have this system that allows people to pull out so easily or demand the price is reduced hours before exchanging?

InkedGreen I agree with you up to a point - the only problem with the sellers getting the survey done is that it leaves them the option of getting a 'friendly' surveyor who might gloss over some faults! I think that a deposit would be a better idea - non refundable once the survey has been done by the buyer. Unfortunately these days, very few people have stashed up the £000's needed for a deposit and rely on the sale of their property to pay the deposit on their new one. Along with 95 or even 100% mortgages I don't know if this would cause more problems for the housing market!

It is very annoying when people pull out. They keep on looking for other properties I’m afraid and it’s difficult to stop this. Family circumstances change.

It’s also fairly normal to haggle on price if the survey shows up issues which cost money to put right. Sellers could sell houses which don’t need work of course. This would speed a lot of things up and then there would be little to haggle over post survey.

Most people haggle over buying a car. Why would they not try and get the best price they can when buying a house?

A non returnable deposit would financially cripple some people. New developments usually require it but most people don’t Factor this in.

The system in England is atrocious. The buyer has zero protection, very much like private tenants. The seller can withdraw even after exchanging contracts as they don't put down a deposit unlike the buyer.

If a seller were to withdraw after exchange there would be significant financial penalties. It is incredibly rare.

If course haggling on the price after the survey is expected, that's why it should be done upfront and penalties for any surveyor that misses things.

It's just unnecessary messy and if this third time of sstc failed I'm tempted to just go via an auction.

My buyers could be putting in offers on 10 properties at once with no intention of buying any of them

The Scottish system moves closer the English system every day

I agree we need reforms in all areas of the housing market so that it works for the benefit of people who need homes.

I came on to say the same as user. The Scottish system used to be better, but is now becoming more like the English system unfortunately. We had two buyers pull out on us when we sold our house as missives are now not being signed until much later than they used to be.

We tried to buy a house in a specific town and it took us years. We made offers on 5 houses over the course of a year in total but due to crappy surveys we had to pull out every time.
I'm talking about illegal extensions, roofs that needed replacing, damp, a leaking back boiler etc.
The first house we tried to buy, we made our offer, had a full survey, found a few issues and the seller wouldn't let us have these explored before buying (they didn't live their, the literally just flipped the property), then they wouldn't allow anymore viewings and wouldn't budge on the price. Finally got them to agree to reduce £7k for the roof, paid for our searches and we were due to exchange when we found out that we were actually in a contract race with another two buyers. After we had shelled out all that money, we still had no guarantee that we would be able to buy it. Anyways someone else got their contract in first so we didn't get to buy it. The estate agents were awful and not interested. We had never bought a house before so we didn't know all the rules or the order you do things and they didn't offer any guidance.

We finally bought our current house and the seller was amazing. He liked us, it had been his mum's house and his childhood house and wanted it to go to a young family. After we had viewed it, he chased the estate agents to see if we wanted to put an offer in, he even told them he would accept less from us and told them once we offered, they were to take the house off the market. He was true to his word every step of the way. The only thing was he offered to send us the room measurements so we could start buying curtains etc and he had measured one of the walls wrong and now our sofa doesn't really fit and blocks one of the doors in the lounge oh well!

We exchanged last week, moving next week after 2 sales fell through. Has taken us 6 months all in. So stressful as we also had to factor in DC moving schools.

The system is deeply flawed and the only ones who really benefit are solicitors and surveyors.

Hang in there and fingers crossed this one goes through for you.

Thanks Joan!

illegal extensions, roofs that needed replacing, damp, a leaking back boiler etc.

Is it just me or are these all pretty common and not that concerning, less so the extention without pp.

We live in a damp country and any roof over 40 years old most surveyors will say to replace.

I do think some buyers freak out over the reports. Unless it's a well built new build they'll always throw up a load of potential issues.

I agree
having bought in another country, it was a lot less stressful. exchange happens 3days after offer is accepted. all searches/surveys are part of the seller's pack and mortgage agreed by buyer as well. completion happens about 4 weeks later.
and all properties are sold empty.

Which country is that out of interest?

Sounds wonderful orangeshoebox.
We've bought in the uk, but only sold in the US, so much easier. But it is also easy to find a short term rental apartment to move to if you haven't found another house to buy, or have a gap between yours selling and the next one finalizing the sale.
I'm dreading selling here when we are ready to.

That sounds amazing! In the UK it's like 8 months of your life it takes over and I hate this feeling of being a bit trapped.

The system is deeply flawed and the only ones who really benefit are solicitors

Surveyors may benefit, but solicitors acting on a fixed fee basis only get paid on completion, so previous aborted transactions would not earn the solicitor any money, even though work has been carried out. Search fees are not paid to the solicitor, they are paid to the search agents and are their fees, so a solicitor does not earn money from this.

In this country, no surveys or sellers packs etc are done prior to finding a buyer. Once a buyer is found, all the legal work begins and exchange only happens when all the legal work is complete. Completion is just the physical movement of monies from lenders and buyers, plus checking all signatures, account numbers, ID to make sure it is all in order.

In order for exchange to happen much more quickly, a lot of the legal work would have to be done at the same time as marketing and some things, such as searches, management packs and title register and mortgage offers have time limits on them, so if the property took a long time to sell, some of these would need to be done again.

Perhaps some guidelines for estate agents could also be made mandatory. EAs do not have legal training, but as part of the marketing of the property, the lease and title documents should be available to view, even though potential buyers would be advised that the EA cannot comment on any of the information contained within. Buyers would at least have the opportunity to view the documents before making an offer and then finding out half way through the process that there is a problem with the lease terms, for example.

Completely agree the system here is a shambles. We are more than four months into the process after putting our house in the market. Found a buyer in less than three weeks, found a lovely house to buy 6 weeks later. Spent over £2000 on searches, survey and legal fees only to have our vendor pull out last week (changed their mind) and then our buyer’s buyer pulled out as well, same reason! These are peoples lives and money we are talking about, people should be committed when they buy and sell!
Grrr!!! Gutted!!!

chains - they make things unnecessarily complicated.
and having to move all at the same time (usually) without having a chance to properly inspect and clean the new place.

Peoples lives change though don’t they? They might have a very good reason for pulling out. Sick child, job move to somewhere else - they don’t all pull out because they were not serious at the time.

If I saw a house and it had faults I would haggle. If I then saw another similar house which had been meticulously maintained and was a similar price, I would pull out of the first one and buy the second one. People do this all the time and vendors should do their maintenance! If a buyer has doubts and might need to spend more to put right lack of maintenance, they will carry on looking if the house is not unique, eg in a street where all the nearby streets have identical houses. They would continue to purchase if this was a special house and they couldn’t get better, eg in a small village where little comes into the market.

No, 40 year old roofs do not need replacing! Unless they have developed a fault or not been maintained. I’m sitting under a 50 year old one and it will last another 50 easily! We maintain it!

As someone who has had 2 buyers drop out already, I completely sympathise at how non-committal the system is here.

We've bought in the uk, but only sold in the US, so much easier. But it is also easy to find a short term rental apartment to move to if you haven't found another house to buy, or have a gap between yours selling and the next one finalizing the sale.

I think this is the big issue here in the UK. I looked into selling, moving into a rental and then buying after. But what a headache! 6 month minimum rental tie in, deposit to raise (which won't be returned until after move out so can't use to pay fees), double moving fees which are not cheap here, storage fees possibly, mortgages that you can't put 'on hold' easily or end up with large early repayment charges...

It's just a massive hassle, and I don't blame anyone for not wanting to do it (it would very much be last resort for me). I think if this was a much easier process then people might consider it much more easily!

BubblesBuddy I understand that people’s lives change but in our case it was a simple change of mind which tells me that they weren’t fully committed in the first place! There should be a penalty for this or a way for us to recoup our costs! If people are not fully committed they should not really get themselves into the system in the first place! Or have a system where people are committed after a certain time into the process so that time wasters can drop out.
We are going to get buyer’s insurance next time we are going to have an offer accepted and will be much more pushy from the start.

Inkedgreen we didn't freak out at the reports. The bank wouldn't give us the mortgage based on the reports.

How can anyone tell if people are keen or not? What should they pay and how should they get it back if something does go wrong and they need to pull out. Some of us have had to put up with vendors who don’t really want to sell either. They also waste time and spoil dreams. Neither side is squeaky clean. Should vendors have to pay if they decide to withdraw the property from the market? Who collects the money and who polices it? There would be lots of problems!

Bubbles other countries manage just fine with far better systems! So your post is null and void.

If there was a more committal system bubbles you would already weed out the time wasters in the first place - on both sides, vendors and buyers. If I knew that there was a financial implication of changing my mind I would think twice before I make an offer on a house as a buyer/ put my house on the market as a seller. Both sides would be more likely to do their due diligence prior to committing.