EA must have revealed our best and final figure

[KimGa]

In March our dream house came on the market for 695k. Loads of interest - it went to Best and Finals. Our offer was 741k. We had a first time buyer buying ours and we wrote a letter to the older lady selling about why we wanted the house so much (grew up nearby, children already at local schools etc).

We didn’t get it. It went to another older lady, in a longer chain who had also written a letter. EA said bids were close but that ‘it was also an emotional decision’. I took comfort in the fact that we couldn’t have gone any higher and the winning bid must have been a few thousand more.

It went through in July and I’ve just found the sold price online - 741.5k. It cannot be coincidence that the other bidder just happened to bid £500 more than my odd number bid which was 46k over asking. The EA must have revealed what ours was and asked her to go just over it. We were never offered the opportunity to increase.

I guess I already know it’s up to a seller who they sell to but I feel like this was deeply unfair - AIBU?

We are about to complete on another house now but it will always be the one that got away.

I know it’s been done to death on here but I really really hate the system of buying and selling. Over the last few years it’s all the stupid ‘you must have sold and be able to prove mortgage’ to even view a house, they all seem to be ‘offers over’ so pretty much impossible to guess the value of the house. I just want to know the price!

I do understand that a thing is worth what someone is willing to pay but the EA have literally spiralled the market up up up. Bonkers. Half the time the bank surveyors say it’s not worth the value but unless someone is at a really high % mortgaged that doesn’t matter if they are willing/able to take the risk themselves.

I would be more than happy for the market to relax and all houses drop a bit so we can move without all the stress - I don’t need the imaginary ‘gain’ in this house since I bought 15years ago, unless I downsize I would never see it anyway (and with a growing family I need a bigger house not smaller!)

It doesn't make any difference whether it's fishy or not. If the OP genuinely offered the maximum they could pay, and the house sold for more, then there's nothing more they could have done regardless of any dubious conduct by the EA.

It would only be potentially concerning if the house had sold for less than the OP's offer - but even then, as pps have suggested, the price might have been revised following issues on the survey.

I think you've made lots of assumptions which are not necessarily true. Yes, it could absolutely be that the EAs revealed the amount (as others have said, there is little regulation or transparency in the EA process which is why these problems arise) but it could genuinely have been a coincidence in respect of the offer amount and the seller's preferred buyer.

We lost out at a closing date (same as best-and-final sealed bids). There was an offer for £350 more than us. And one for £500 more, which is the one that secured the house. There were 8 offers in total.

Its just the way it goes sometimes - most people have an idea of what a given house is worth to them and it’s not surprising that offers will be close unless the property is a staggeringly unusual one-off type.

No. There’s no evidence of this whatsoever. It is far more likely that the seller after seeing all the best & final offers decided that they wanted to sell to the other buyer and instructed the EA to counter with the £741.5k figure to seal the deal with them.

Best and final means you can’t raise your offer. No one can. But the seller can absolutely look at all the offers, pick one buyer and counter offer any figure they want to seal the deal with that buyer.

We lost a house a few years back due to an Estate Agent divulging our best and final bid. We really wanted it and had bid significantly over the asking price and were told it was in the bag. Then a different agent in the same office took another couple around, told them what we bid, and lo and behold they bid just over and got the house. Our estate agent told us what had happened as he was really pissed off that he lost the commission on the sale as well. It's really gutting, but sadly nothing you can do about it. Luckily we found a much nicer house in the end, so I'm kind of relieved it happened! I hope you do too.

l these months I’ve believed the other bidder went higher than us so fair enough we didn’t win

Highest offer doesn’t automatically win. The seller can pick a lower offer for other (legal) reasons, cash buyer, shorter chain, emotional, etc.

I'd hate yo get one of those letters saying why you desperately want the house. It'd make me feel aware of their shattered dream when I went with the highest offer. And that'd piss me off!

Or getting / not getting one of those sentimental letters

I think you need to try to emotionally let go from that house, it’s gone, you weren’t getting it. Stop thinking on it now.

I remember getting into a bidding war over a house I eventually bought.
the estate agent told me the other bidder left had said we couldn’t afford the house and were shocked at what we’d bid as best and final. Turns out the agent had told them our identity and we lived 3 houses apart in a village 5 miles from the house for sale. We were upsizing for a number of reasons amd they were downsizing. The agent also disclosed the size of our deposit and household income (they wouldn’t let us bid until we had spoken to their mortgage broker and had proof of funds.)

Wow
The nerve of the EA

You got to get up damn early to beat those older ladies.

Mortgage might have down valued

Agree. I never submitted one because it’s a business deal and always thought they were cringe tbh. Never read any of the ones given to us either as I view them as attempted emotional blackmail (sorry!) and didn’t want my distaste for the whole practice to bias me against the writer(s) and their offer.

I got a sentimental email when I was selling mine. Was from a local couple who wanted to stay in the area and TBF there were not many other opportunities for them to purchase my type of property.

I went with their offer and, despite a number of setbacks, they lost their buyer at one point and I needed time at the end following exchange to find somewhere to rent, they were very committed to the progress of the sale.

I know not every letter writer is this ingenuous but in their case it was an indication that they were.

You don't have any evidence for your allegation though.
The bid absolutely could have been remarkably close to yours - as a pp said, people have 'calculated' what they can offer by their experience of trying to buy other houses and missing out. There's nothing to say their calculation wasn't along the same lines as yours, and they thought not making it a round figure might just give them the edge.
However, the fact that the EA has said "it was an emotional decision" suggests that it was nothing to do with the extra £500 - let's be honest, on a property at that price, £500 more or less is irrelevant. However much we know, on paper that buying and selling ought to be a business decision, there are still many of us that have obvious emotional attachments to what have been our homes, and would be influenced but things other than cash. It could well have been a bid from a family member of a friend or neighbour or something.....it gives the vendor a sort of 'security' they are really invested in buying there and therefore less likely to pull out. If I were selling for that sort of amount, that sort of 'emotional decision' would carry more weight than £500 price difference.

I would assume it needed work, the buyer negotiated the value downwards until the seller said they would not go below the value of the second highest bidder.

We had to write a letter for our current house, the sellers were selling their childhood home (probate) and it was a very emotional decision for them. They wanted a young local family apparently. I know they still check up on us via our next door neighbour but it doesn’t bother me. I personally ignore those letters after I read an article about the bare faced lies people tell in them.

I think I read that article too.

We had had an offer in on a property which had been accepted, though they wouldn't take the house off the market because they were going through a legal process to sell and couldn't (very complicated). Another bidder came in a few months down the line, we went to best and final. Won. Then the other bidder just upped their offer. 😡Seller, being decent, accepted our offer, which was significantly higher than our first one, because we had been patient and hadn't tried to cheat in the best and final. After the survey, we had to drop the offer a bit (though still higher than our previously accepted offer and not by anything like as much as the work needing done). There could be all sorts of reasons it went for what it did in your case- they may have offered more, got a bad survey, dropped their offer, and seller may have insisted that they wouldn't accept less than your offer.

Surely that's against the rules- disclosing personal information like that? It seems other posters have had even more personal info disclosed to rival bidders. I can't see how that's even legal.

@KimGa welcome to the world of estate agents. One of the most corrupt professions. Assume the worst and you won't be disappointed I can assure you having dealt with them many times.

I’ve heard of (developers mostly) offering £x over the best offer.

Could that be what has happened here? “My best offer is £500 over whatever OP offers.”

DD offered 205 on her house, someone else offered 206,250. The estate agent rang DD and asked if she would match the price as the seller wanted her to have the house. (They clicked at the viewing and turned out they worked for the same trust).

She matched it and got the house. Sounds like similar to your situation.