Estate Agents not letting us put in an offer?

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Hi all. We have no experience with dealing with estate agents so I was hoping someone would be able to advise on the below!

We really want to put in an offer on a property. It’s listed on Rightmove (and has been for 5 weeks), and is a £900,000 house on a street full of £2m+ properties. The area is full of elderly people in average properties that are then typically snapped up by developers and resold for insane amounts.

I initially rang hoping to view the property after it has been on the market for 2 weeks. I was told that there are to be no more viewings as the seller has accepted an offer in principle, but was waiting for them to sell their own house. End of call.

I rang back a week later and asked about the house again as it was still on RightMove. I was told that it was still on Right Move as it hadn’t sold as the seller was waiting for the buyers own house to sell. I asked if I could view as I may want to put an offer in too and was told no as the buyer had accepted the sellers offer (then surely it should be taken off of Right Move?).

A couple of weeks on and the house is still available to view. I rang off of another number and was told the same story again.

Can anyone shed any light onto this? Surely if the sellers are waiting on the buyers to sell, then they may still be interested in receiving new (potentially higher) offers? I can’t help but think something dodgy is going on by the estate agents as the house is such a bargain in a very desirable area.

Don't understand why you can't just take no for an answer. And yes I have critical thinking capacity in tact.

Estate agents are often bent and holding property for their developer mates.

That’s so far removed from what the OP is saying. OP is saying - this house that is for sale, I’d like to buy it. And the agent is saying - no.

So the suggestion is that OP connects directly with the seller via a personal letter, because it’s not unheard of that EA’s will sell to people known to them at their benefit, and not the sellers. There’s a reason it’s not marked SSTC or Under offer. If OP wants the house, they’re well within their right to attempt contact with the owner.

Exactly, I don't understand why what they are saying is "answering weirdly"?

They've accepted an offer from someone who still need to sell their property. It might not be the norm but isn't unheard of especially if they particularly want it to go to that buyer for some reason.

Because cash buyers are often developers… I was involved in the sale of a family members property through probate. The one thing they stipulated was “don’t sell it to a landlord” which in that part of the country effectively excluded all cash buyers. Because they didn’t want their lovely neighbours saddled with a rental next door.
Stop seeing this as a conspiracy, you’ve no idea of the vendor circumstances but are making a nuisance of yourself to the EA. Look elsewhere.

They’re usually buyers who have already sold.

Agreed. Answering weirdly = ‘I don’t like their answers because it’s not what I want to hear.’

I know the frustration of being pipped to the post on a property, but at some point you have to move on.

Buyers who have already sold does not always mean they have the cash to buy a house without a mortgage.

It does if they’re offering cash.

Yes buyers who have already sold does not always = cash buyer.

I'm just saying what the law says - no more and no less. Of course the prospective seller should exercise due diligence and question the morals of gazumping, but the law does not require them to.

They've sold the house. The estate agents are not interested in people trying to gazump the buyers, presumably because it's gone for an amount that they expect/cash buyers. This is standard procedure. It's not formally sold but in process, solicitors working on it, searches being performed etc. it takes months before something is formally sold. If it was up for significantly below value you can bet your bottom dollar that it did go for that. Are you new to the British property market?

I repeat: it does if they’re offering cash.

I think the EA is trying to sell the purchasers house. That way they get two sales.

When we sold my parents place it when

• for sale
• under offer
• sold subject to contract
• sold

If it's "under offer" the buyers are still legally free to accept a higher offer If it's "sold subject to contract" then they are not, unless the contract with the other buyers falls through for another reason.

My parents’ house may have looked like this. We received an offer below asking price but from a lovely family (friends of friends) who wanted to make it their forever home.

We accepted the offer but, due to commitments as executors, had to leave it on the market until the buyers were proceedable.

We received other offers from developers who wanted to do the £30k of work required to make £200k of profit. We knew our dad would have been absolutely turning in his grave at that prospect & that both parents would have wanted the house to go to another family who would live & grow in it as they had done.

So we waited. And it was the right choice. The family are still living there 15 years on & have made the house look beautiful.

This! Not everyone is out to sell for the highest bidder.

They could change it to say Under offer or SSTC. So it seems odd to me it’s saying for sale if it isn’t!

This is gazumping.

Edited: oh I meant to reply to another post. Anyway, posters suggesting you put a note through the door saying you’ll offer higher than the existing offer, is gazumping.

for what it’s worth, as a former estate agent, I don’t think the EA are acting weirdly and what you said earlier about the way they’re talking about the property seems totally normal. Just accept you can’t view this property for now as the seller has decided not to accept more viewers after receiving an acceptable offer, even though it’s an incomplete chain. It may well come available again to view, and you’ve registered your interest. If it’s that sought after, I don’t imagine you’re the only person.

It’s probably because on Rightmove etc you have to change it to SSTC once you’ve put through a memorandum of sale on your own system etc, and it hasn’t happened yet because the chain is incomplete. It’s quite common for properties to stay up and still say for sale, even if the vendors have accepted an offer and don’t want any further viewings right now.

We once went to view a house in Scotland. It was an overnight trip with two young kids. Parked up outside the house and got a phone call from the estate agent. I assumed they were going to say they were running late. No, she said the viewing was cancelled, the owner had just accepted an offer. I'm still furious, this was 7 years ago!

I would put a note through the door. If the estate agent doesn't want to play ball go over their head

This is poor advice. Estate agents work for the seller, not the buyer, and the OP doesn’t know what has transpired between them and the people whose offer has been accepted. As another poster has said, imagine this is you that’s had an offer accepted and the vendor doesn’t want any more viewings while you sell your house, and another person thinks it’s not right, so tries to gazump you? Terrible advice.

How about putting your query up on the FB group for the area? You'd have to be very careful how you worded your query to avoid anything which might be construed as defamatory by the agents.

What would the query say?

It’s vanishingly unlikely the executors are on a local FB group and why would any people recently moved into the developments want to get involved (if they are on such a group
in the first place!)