Why do EA send agents to do show rounds, who have never seen house?

[GoingDownLikeBHS]

... and who have little or no information about the house? They seem to gather next to nothing from discussions/when they do the photos, then send an agent who is going to have to answer "don't know" to every question. I'm just getting the house ready for some viewings this afternoon, spoke to a young lady who is apparently doing the show rounds and she clearly had no clue about the place. Is this something all agents do and you have to suck it up, or is it something I should have prevented in the first place? Or is it actually good practice and I'm missing something? This is our 3rd agent, been on/off market for nearly a year now :(

What are other vendors' experiences?

This was really painful for us as buyers. There was an EA who knew nothing and would say they’d find out what we needed to know, but would never call us. Happened loads of times. Because it was so painful we just forgot about the house tbh and moved on

The annoying EAs are the ones who keep talking and talking and talking while you’re looking around. I just want to tell them to stfu. My other half thinks they do it in purpose to distract you from someone sinister in the house lol

No, the ones who do that are generally the larger chain agents and they’re also generally crap. When you instruct an agent, choose a small one with a few local branches and insist that the agent doing the viewings can talk confidently about the house, what the heating system is like, what improvements you’ve made etc.

We learned from painful experience and sacked one lot because the agent failed to turn up to do the viewing, leaving us to do it, failed to offer any feedback on any of the viewings, arranged a viewing for an inconvenient time, which we told them to change and turned up anyway, as we were hosting dinner. He left with a flea in his ear.

We deliberately asked about this when looking for an agent as we wanted a single contact (two max). We bought through am agent who had Saturday staff to show houses- but hit the jackpot with the woman who showed us twice as she clearly knew the area , had enough detail and was fantastic at pointing out things to us that would work for us. She showed us around a few places, and, has she has no skin in the game, didn't bother too much if she thought we weren't interested.

I created a ‘selling guide’ with FAQs for our agents, and updated it to answer feedback and new questions.
I don’t believe anyone in the big chain we were with before ever even read it, as they kept coming back to us with questions that were answered in the guide.
We’re with an independent EA now, who’s fantastic, keeps in touch, has read my selling guide etc. And while we got an offer with the chain (fell through) we are now juggling multiple offers with the independent.

Our agents have been brilliant and really hands-on. Local and not a chain.

And we sold quickly too, a weird and quirky house! They really understood what was needed.

I don’t really need the agent to know stuff. What do they need to know on a first viewing? I am perfectly capable of looking round and making a judgement.

In Scotland the vendors usually do the viewings, which I much prefer. In my experience the only time the agents send someone to do the viewings is if the vendor is on holiday or otherwise unavailable.

As a buyer it’s a pain in the bum. We were asking about the boundaries of one house - they didn’t have a clue yet said they had sold several houses including the neighbours several time over the last decade. Another house they didn’t know who the owners even were - a little digging tells me it’s an equity release company.
I don’t think they were exactly unusual questions?

It's annoying. I'm a would be first time buyer and had an EA this week who didn't know anything about the flat (it was his first time there). I would've thought 'what does the service charge include?' was a basic question.

Also, it took about five minutes to get in (lots of fiddling about with keys) and ten minutes to get out. I think it would've been helpful for the seller to leave a note in the flat answering questions likely to come up (in the event of a useless EA) e.g. 'how long is the lease?'.

I personally dislike the sellers being present during viewings. I feel as though I'm walking on eggshells, and I want to be out of there as quickly as possible.

I kinda agree with this. I personally just can't stand it when they are just talking in your ear as you're looking around. I don't care about their opinion of the house either.

I agree they say stuff I don’t need to know eg what they would demolish/redecorate/ how many times it’s been sold as because I can do that myself from decent floor plans, interior photos and a ‘drive by’ view. But I can’t always easily find out stuff which does have a bearing on my very expensive purchase. Like is it in probate, when did the process start, who currently owns it or has an interest in the property, length of leasehold, boundaries who is responsible for what, when extensions were built (not all councils have digitised their back records beyond 1995). When were boilers installed or looked at, Is the loft spray foamed? (Apparently taking my own ladder to look in lofts - just want to look inside the hatch not get up inside,is frowned on) To name just a few. On the plus side they do offer to try and find out, but as yet haven’t actually found out the answers to any of my questions.

Work to the sellers advantage, plausible deniability.

Next door is up for sale - cute cottage, put your own stamp on it. Except it floods, it's had two new roofs in 20 years and the neighbour called the police about our behaviour.

It's been for sale since October 2022, two agents, etc the EA who showed one lot round just under played everything including stuff like length on the market which is there on the internet.

If you get the 'truth' before falling in love you are never going to put an offer in.

We did all our own viewings. Estate agents are needed where the owner is overseas or a long way away though,

Agree they generally don't know anything about that house and what they say has to be taken with a large pinch of salt.

@BookSquirrel it these are things that are going to come to light further in the process. I just don’t want to waste everyone’s time for a question which I would expect the vendor to be able to answer, and I would expect an estate agent in turn, to be able to answer? I’m in the markets as a cash buyer willing to forgo a survey for a quick purchase. So yes, I want to know the answers because they would make the difference between me proceeding or looking elsewhere. I’m not willing to wait months in chains or for probate or dealing with people who can’t answer basic property questions. Nor do I want to limit my search for ‘the one’ by going only to see auction property.

I have found the more expensive EAs don’t do this whereas the cheaper ones do. Sometimes you get what you pay for though it may vary by location too I’m not sure.

When I was selling my house they sender a different agent for every viewing. They’d arrive and then ask me questions before the viewers arrived eg do you have a driveway (yes at the back of the house - one of the biggest selling look points to the house considering it’s on street parking for 95% of houses in my street!). How old is the boiler, where is the boiler, oh you have 3 bathrooms? Etc etc

infuriating… had no idea what I was paying them for … apart from to stick the house on RightMove

Well that's what keeps happening @Alphabet1spaghetti2 a buyer like yourself turns up, the vendor disappears, the guide just says 'dont know'.
Everyone hopes you'll fall in love with it and forget that you ever wanted to know if it floods/if the front cob wall is under pinned/if the floor is original.

It's a total waste of everyone's time, and my elderly neighbour is another year older.

It's well overpriced, that's the biggest problem.

@BookSquirrelit’s so annoying! But thanks, I don’t feel as if I’m being unreasonable now. Which is actually helpful! 😄. Meanwhile the search carries on!

I hate a viewing with the vendor, hard to be open with them following you around.
But a good agent has a detailed briefing pack. If they are busy it may just be Saturday staff for an open house - DP did this for a while - but they should give them the key Q&A. And if someone asks a question they don’t know the answer to, actually get back to them.

Thanks all - some differing opinions here; personally I don't mind going round with a vendor when I'm viewing, but it's not ideal to have them regaling you with tales of how much work they put into sanding the bannisters! So in turn I don't want to make my prospective buyers feel uncomfortable. When the agent arrived yesterday I asked her how she managed when she didn't know anything about the house and she said everything she needed to know was in the sales details in their listing - the example she gave was the EPC. I tried to press her by saying what about schools (ie., the catchments we are in) and she said "yes, there's lots of schools here". I wasn't exactly filled with confidence but the viewers were waiting outside so I left. Hope they asked about the EPC ...!!

We're just at the 2nd week with this lot, its a chain that have a good sales record here but I suspect they push vendors to drop the prices so that's why! When this contract ends if we havent sold I think we'll try the independents.

Am I the only buyer who really doesn’t care about the epc? I can work out if it’s going to cost a bomb to run just buy looking around inside - ditto for knowing about insulation/ light bulbs etc. tell tale signs for anyone to see… waste of money and time for the vendors to get it done Imo.

The EPC could make it harder to sell when it comes to your turn, so that is worth taking into account unless you intend to do home improvements to improve the EPC.

@Twiglets1 but half the time they aren’t even close to the reality of the house? Ours says we have cavity walls - we don’t we are a mid terrace built in 1903 ! It also says we have the old incandescent light bulbs - nope they are the most efficient modern ones you can get, apparently the loft didn’t have insulation- it is so old it’s dusty and under insulated flooring! Windows apparently single
glazed as was the exterior doors - all could be seen to have been done as double glazed and composite 9 years prior to the report being written from the street view history. It’s like they took an epc from another property and copy and pasted. Terrible rip off and incorrect. This is the epc done for when we bought it - all these things could be seen to be not true on viewing.
Not even bothered to ask for it on the properties we are viewing because it doesn’t cover any pertinent questions like boundaries!!