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Original poster

House fell through, again.

27 replies

Chipsahoy · 02/05/2021 21:57

We’ve been under offer three times in the last four months. Each has fallen through for different reasons, couldn’t get mortgage or personal reasons. Or messed us about and don’t produce paperwork to get it off the market.

So fed up! Estate agent says they have never seen anything like it, so many properties fallen through.
We’ve been on sale 6 months and have had offers all at asking price so don’t think we are over priced? Do we just sit tight and wait for it to work out or lower the price?

So frustrating as we are relocating and want to get our kids settled in new schools. We will be renting so it’s not like we’ve missed out on dream property. Just frustrating and needed a rant!

Had another viewing today but they said they were just checking out what sort of houses were on offer but they weren’t looking for anything as big as ours. Grrr. So sick of tidying the house for viewings!

OP posts:

Puntastic · 02/05/2021 21:59

Get on to your estate agent- particularly in times of COVID they shouldn't be allowing time-wasters (who openly admit that they are time-wasters) to view your house.

mobear · 02/05/2021 22:48

Agree with @Puntastic, your EA should really be vetting beforehand.

ilovesouthlondon · 03/05/2021 05:01

EA should get rid of the tyre kickers. Perhaps try having an open house to create competition and hopefully you'll only have to tidy the place once?

LongLiveGoblingKing · 03/05/2021 05:40

That sounds so frustrating. Your EA need to be a bit more on top of weeding out the time wasters. For us you can only view after doing a virtual tour which seems to have reduced the viewings to only people who are actually interested.

You are getting offers at asking so it seems like your price is right.

We had an offer on our house fall through last week because the buyers wanted to remove the downstairs internal walls to make it all open plan, and after consulting a builder didn't realise how expensive that would be to do. So they withdrew their offer. It's annoying.

Original poster

Chipsahoy · 03/05/2021 07:58

Thanks. Will speak to estate agent.
The market has suddenly become stagnant here. No more viewings booked. Houses just sitting here. Some returned to market having sold, like us.
I’ve worked in property searches for ten years and never seen anything like this.
Fingers crossed things will start moving again soon.

OP posts:

Original poster

Chipsahoy · 03/05/2021 07:59

@LongLiveGoblingKing sorry to hear yours fell through also. It’s very annoying isn’t it.

I actually love our home and garden so up until now have felt fairly content in it taking so long. But I am keen to get my boys in school by September and it’s looking increasingly unlikely.

OP posts:

kkkkkkkcc · 03/05/2021 09:37

@Chipsahoy You should ask for a non-refundable deposit of £3000 or £5000 to avoid time wasters. Do not remove your property from the market before they instruct the survey. It's all about putting pressure on them.

Changingwiththetimes · 03/05/2021 09:47

@kkkkkkkcc that's not going to happen unless it becomes an industry wide standard. No one will put a non refundable deposit down before they've even had a survey.
But I di agree the process needs to be made much more formal. Offer/acceptance is a legal agreement. A (refundable) holding deposit, timeline for getting survey and mortgage offer (and councils getting their act together re searches, alot if which can be automated). Contingencies would be survey issues or financial, though buyers should show they have applied more than for one mortgage if rejected, and if course will have already produced proof of funds. On the sellers side they should agree to a completion date. If the buyer has to go through hoops to prove they are genuine buyers, then the seller should have to guarantee they will actually sell the house, and when.

kkkkkkkcc · 03/05/2021 09:53

@Changingwiththetimes It is legal to ask for a non-refundable deposit, this will help you to identify the most serious-minded buyer. Some London big agencies have been working in this way for years, it's been working very well.

Changingwiththetimes · 03/05/2021 10:11

@kkkkkkkcc it may be legal but doubt many would do it unless at a very high price point. Not a non refundable one unless there's some repricosity. If seller pulls out I'd want compensation too (I fear I'm facing this currently, and in the end it will cost me about £25k as I will not only miss stamp duty deadline, I will have to rent in London, store my furniture and move twice. I am ready to go - seller is stalling after initially saying they would rent so we could complete by June 30, all negotiated at offer stage, but as nothing is binding there's no consequence for them).

kkkkkkkcc · 03/05/2021 10:24

There should a binding contract bind both the buyer and the seller before exchange. If one of them pulls out for their own reason, they should compensate the other one for wasting their time.

I have been asked for a non-refundable deposit of £5000 when I was buying a property. The agent asked me to sign a contract. If I pull out, I lose the £5000, but there is no consequence if the seller pulls out. I wasn't able to negotiate the unfair terms because they told me the property was so popular. Luckily, it's a good property indeed.

Original poster

Chipsahoy · 03/05/2021 10:34

I definitely wouldn’t ask for a deposit. We are on a train line which puts people off enough! We haven’t removed the house from the market at all, we’ve kept it on. It’s always fallen through while under offer, before sold stc.

OP posts:

flashbac · 03/05/2021 10:40

@Chipsahoy

Thanks. Will speak to estate agent. The market has suddenly become stagnant here. No more viewings booked. Houses just sitting here. Some returned to market having sold, like us. I’ve worked in property searches for ten years and never seen anything like this. Fingers crossed things will start moving again soon.

Where is this, rough area? Curious really as I thought the market was still hot.

stickygotstuck · 03/05/2021 11:10

I so agree woth kkkkkkkcc. And it should apply to both buyer and seller. If seller pulls out they pay you the 5k or whatever (and they return your money, obviously). That's how it's done in other counties. I just cannot see how the English system is legal.

We were the buyers having a seller pull out after six months for no reason on exchange day. Murderous thoughts don't begin to explain how we felt!

It's cost us thousands in price rises and wasted fees, plus a whole year of our lives. That's assuming we haven't been priced out altogether. Our offer was accepted just before lockdown 1.0 and we're a year down the line, no house and a vastly different market where we can't afford much and everything gets snapped up.

Feel sorry for the OP, but at least they haven't lost any money yet. Good luck OP.

TakeYourFinalPosition · 03/05/2021 11:26

I’d second talking to your EA here... we offered on a house in March. To view it, we had to confirm that we’d either already sold ours or didn’t have anything to sell. To make an offer, we had to show that we had the cash or give our AIP.

There shouldn’t be loads of people viewing and making offers who aren’t serious, especially in Covid times...

The deposit idea is an interesting one on a theoretical basis, but it’s not the done thing in England, with the old exception of very popular properties in London, and so it’s a bit of a moot point here. It’s uncommon enough that it’d put off a lot of people, which wouldn’t help you sell.

surreygirl1987 · 03/05/2021 11:42

I thought 'under offer' was the same as 'sold stc'. Are they different?

stickygotstuck · 03/05/2021 12:11

@surreygirl1987

I thought 'under offer' was the same as 'sold stc'. Are they different?

Not quite the same. Under offer means someone has offered but it has not been officially accepted - i.e. they are still inviting other, higher offers.

Except neither term means nothing legally, hence the problem of purchases falling through at the drop of a hat.

m0therofdragons · 03/05/2021 12:15

Everything was flying off rightmove until last week. I’m assuming the average 12 weeks to move means many will now be put off as they won’t benefit from the stamp duty holiday. I’m not moving but love rightmove stalking for design ideas so I’ve noticed a few that were sold suddenly reappear. It’ll pick up again but not I think May and June will be quiet then it’ll hopefully pick up and if July. (That’s my non expert opinion). I think initially prices will dip a little bit not much.

stickygotstuck · 03/05/2021 15:51

That's what I thought m0ther, but the window is very small (completion by 30 June) and the average time to completion is now 5 months, so I'd have expected things to slow down way before, around January. Didn't happen, although it's definitely not unexpected that the feeding frenzy would slow down/stop by now.

Original poster

Chipsahoy · 03/05/2021 19:46

Thanks all.
We didn’t reach stc as the first didn’t produce proof of funds. He was cash buyer. The second had mortgage in principle and we said we’d take it off market once they had mortgage approved. Their mortgage was not approved. The third, they hadn’t sold so we said we’d not take it off market until they did. They went under offer but then pulled out of their sale and withdrew offer due to personal issues.

Luckily we’ve had two more viewings today and another booked this weekend. It’s just a frustrating market.

OP posts:

CatAndHisKit · 04/05/2021 01:05

OP, I would reduce the price a little due to being on the train line - sounds like you aer not getting thatmany viewings, three in a week is much lower than average for well-priced houses. You seem not to mind being a little flexible on price - so try that!
It's possible that two of them pulled out due to house being 'not a good value' especially if mortgage co didn't approve.

Onandoff · 04/05/2021 06:48

@stickygotstuck

We were the buyers having a seller pull out after six months for no reason on exchange day. Murderous thoughts don't begin to explain how we felt!

Feel sorry for the OP, but at least they haven't lost any money yet. Good luck OP.

I don’t know how it would be a reasonable thing to enforce seeing as there is no knowledge of the house until the buyer gets searches and surveys back. This could only be done if the seller had all this information (inc searches, building survey, planning/building regs/fensa certs) in a pack to give potential buyers before offer. This would work. It would also weed out flaky sellers.

Original poster

Chipsahoy · 04/05/2021 09:28

Well second buyers who offered have returned. They say they have the money now. Not keen to reduce as we already are lower because of train line. No houses are selling at all these last few weeks. Ones similar to mine are priced much higher and still sitting there.

Will reduce once market dips. I think everyone probably needs to. We want to be the first to do so once things start to pick up.

OP posts:

Original poster

Chipsahoy · 04/05/2021 09:30

We remortgaged last year and are selling for the price we were valued at. I don’t think we are over priced? However we are happy to reduce when it comes to it. Honestly it’s not about the money really. As long as we can pay the mortgage off so we can relocate and rent and have enough left over for a deposit.

OP posts:

flashbac · 04/05/2021 11:04

Are you comfortable sharing a link of the house?

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