Estate agent fees and private buyers

[Turnips857]

We are in a bit of a funny position. We are putting our house on the market and before we started getting valuations etc I mentioned it to a friend of ours who I knew was looking to buy in the area. They said they would maybe be interested but needed to sort out their mortgage first. They suggested we could sell privately to save on fees.

Meanwhile we went ahead and got valuations and for various reasons one particular agent managed to convince us to put our house on the market with them. We signed a contract but we are still within the 14 day cooling off period. When I signed the terms of business I named my friend as a potentially interested private buyer. The estate agent has been to take photos but we haven’t gone on the market yet and I haven’t yet signed the letter to say we give them permission to market it.

My friend has now managed to sort their mortgage and has made us an offer on the house. We know they are in a position to proceed. So my question is - can we accept their offer without paying any fees to the estate agent? They cannot claim that this offer was a result of their marketing because they haven’t done any yet. There’s no for sale sign outside and nothing on right move, no brochures etc yet as I haven’t signed them off. Thanks!

I think it's pretty obvious they can't. If still within cooling off period you can pull out now.

Even if you proceeded in case the PB fell through I think you've done everything needed so if the PB works out they can't claim they introduced them.

Pull out immediately in writing

And work on your lack of ability not to be persuaded to do stuff.

I wouldn’t think they could claim fees. Presumably that is the whole point of naming potential private buyers in the ts and cs - so that if one of those comes good, the agent can’t claim fees? Otherwise what would be the point.

It seems to imply that potential buyers already named would have come from a previous agent rather than from a private sale. The question is phrased something like “please name any buyers previously interested” so I just wrote the name and stated it was a private buyer.

(And then says stuff about whether the fee would be paid to the previous agent or the current one)

Cancel as part of the cooling off period. They will probably be able to charge you for work they have done eg photos, but that should be it.

There was no previous agent so it's irrelevant. The current potential agent wouldn't have got involved in you paying a fee to a previous agent in any event and your arrangement with a previous agent would be outside the contract. As it's a private buyer and no previous agent there would be no fee to pay anyway.

All you need to know is that the contract makes it clear that if any buyer not introduced by the potential agent buys then there is no fee to pay to them. It may say something about getting reasonable payment for the work they have done already eg professional photos but that depends on the contract and you are in the cooking off period anyway so nothing to pay if you pull out now.

Yes I think it’s still clear that that clause is intended to identify any buyers who have not been introduced by this agent