House selling stress- have we done the right thing?

[Pusstachio]

We’re selling our house. I actually put a thread up here when someone tried to gazump our buyers and we opted to stick with the original people. I deleted as it went onto featured threads and I panicked!

Anyway, post survey our buyers have found a classic survey finding and have advised their dad says it will cost £15k to resolve. We have had numerous verbal quotes of 2-5k and offered a £5k reduction. They have refused to accept these as they are not written and when they called one contractor he couldn’t remember talking to us- fair enough but why are we expected to accept their dad’s best guess? They reiterated they need £15k

We offered £8k to move things on and they still won’t budge. I do think we will get written quotes arriving slowly over the next few weeks but I’m unsure if this is actually helpful if they’re after a £15k reduction no matter what.

The whole thing has been rumbling on for nearly three weeks now and is immensely stressful, I’ve been in tears about it this morning.

How much hassle is it to pull out and re list, has anyone done this and managed to sell without dropping the price? I’m really not convinced they’re being genuine and I’m worried if we get past this there will just be something else crop up.

The Estate Agent works for you. If you want to relist it, then tell them that is what you are instructing them to do.

These buyers sound like too much hassle - move on, and with the next set of buyers ask your agent to make sure they're not going to dick you around.

Wow, definitely agree with other posters - they must have gone higher than they can afford with their bid and now trying to force you down. You are in such a strong position though - with that level of interest in your house, you definitely need to just dump these people and relist. Even if you don't get an offer quite as high as this one, realistically even this offer isn't as high as it was on paper, if you see what I mean, and I'm sure you've got a great chance of getting an offer higher than the current one minus the 15K they are demanding.
I would be super-nervous that even if they agreed to one of your offers at this stage, they might just gazunder you at exchange because it really sounds as though they never had the money to pay for the house, so get shot of them!

This is my exact fear- the only reason not to relist is we might not get their offer minus £15k and feel like we’ve lost out but I think it’s now a huge assumption we’ll get even that if we entirely capitulated and I am confident we’d get close to it quite quickly- we had offers within that range already. Plus we could tell them the house has already had a survey and the only material issue resolved so we won’t be open to any survey issues unless they are new

They are absolutely jerking you around in the hope you’ll cave. I would relist and not give them any more chances. They’re a nightmare now and will continue to be. Cut your losses now. You won’t be sort of another buyer as it’s so much easier to sell going into spring anyway

I think you should re-list due to them being unresponsive. Just bear in mind that you will probably run into this issue with the next buyer. It seems to be the done thing nowadays to renegotiate after a survey.

We sold at the beginning of this year and initially our buyers asked for £25k off following the survey! We agreed at a £10k reduction eventually as they had gone £10k over asking but they initially declined until we instructed the EA to relist. It really soured the relationship and our buyer was difficult throughout. In hindsight I wish I’d just sacked them off at the beginning but we had a newborn, a toddler and a dog and I didn’t want to do all the viewings malarkey again!

Ugh maybe we are just out of step then? But I do not think this is generally standard practice and tbh if they had ever counter-offered we would likely have met them half way, they literally haven’t budged from this completely un-evidenced figure in three weeks.

Your agent is being useless here. They should be on the phone talking to all the other people who were interested. Have they done that do you know? They can do that today.

So this morning the buyer responded saying they want us to do the repair but to x specification and for it to include a full structural survey. We have replied that if they want to spec the work they can fund it and do it themselves and to confirm by 3pm if they want to proceed on those terms. Agent says they can’t get hold of them so every chance they now have only 2 hours to decide.

I think you need to let these buyers go. They are just going to find something else to beat you with and seem the sort to pull out the day before exchange. Just relist it, get DH to sort out the repair, and breathe again. House buying is stressful enough without people like this.

The agent says this as they want it sold and done. Just say no, relist it please. My estate agent wanted to be drop the price just before exchange due to something and I just no - on Monday relist it, they exchanged that day. This buyers are going to cause you nothing but grief.

They’ve asked for until 5pm which we have reluctantly accepted. I think it’s moved to naming a figure, I suppose we will consider how we feel about that.

Shame you are now missing this weekend prospective viewings by waiting until 5.00 pm. I agree with PP that these buyers are playing you and will continue to do so.

Ring your agent and get it onto Rightmove now. Right now.

Don’t take shit for granted from your buyers. They are doing them. You do you. Either they shit or they get off the pot and you know you have a house that will sell.

You DO NOT owe this lot any favours.

We would not get viewings this weekend in fairness, just online ones which I have asked our agent to confirm they would relist tonight for Saturday morning.

Doesn’t matter. You get it out there and you send a message to The Fuckwits. And you remind your agent he works for you. And he needs the house sold at the best price for him to get his best commission.

We had this folk are cheeky - relisted and resold within days, tell your buyers to jog on!

Just a word of warning with all of this. Last year houses sold on a fairly desirable mature housing estate in our nearest big town for around £460,000 for a non extended semi. One with a decent plot and it was a bit more. Now, our friends have sold for £400,000. This is the SE. it’s less than 1 hour on the train from London. 2 similar houses were listed at the same price but theirs was a bit nicer. It’s a big drop but they need to sell. If you need to sell, think carefully about prices. You might find it’s now lower than you think or want.

This 100 times over - your buyers are chancers and your agent is just being lazy - they work for you maybe suggest you can resist elsewhere if its a problem 😅😅

Oh my days @Pusstachio pull out of this sale!!! As has been said, your house is popular if people are bidding against each other to acquire it. It will sell again soon!

As several posters have said, this buyer of yours has ended up paying more than they wanted to, and they're regretting it, and are trying to claw back some money.

Sod that!

We had someone trying knock the price of our house down that we were selling (late 1990s) because it 'didn't have a fireplace.' (It was a small late 1980s semi detached house.) They knew it didn't have a bloody fireplace when they offered the asking price (£38K at the time.) They had seen the house twice! They tried to knock us down to £33K! A 17% drop!!! We had turned down half a dozen other people, and it was only a week or so to exchange of contracts! I burst into tears.

My DH went ballistic. (It was the buyer who phoned me - it was a couple a generation older than us, and it was the man who phoned.) He said they were dropping the price by £5K! DH phoned the agent and told them the buyer had phoned and dropped the price, and he could stuff it, and we are relisting! About an hour later, the agent phoned back and said, 'sorry Mr Zov, this should not have happened. The buyer will still pay the £38K.' Arsehole was chancing his luck! The sale went ahead with the asking price, and we never saw or spoke to the buyer(s) again.

Pull out of the sale and relist @Pusstachio Tell them you're pulling out as you're unhappy with what they're doing. You may even get them suddenly deciding you don't need to drop the price by £15K after all.

What if they try gazunder you close to exchange?
Speaking as someone whose buyers ghosted us (after months of doing nothing and stringing us along), if they don’t enthusiastically want the house you seem in a good position to find people who do!
The whole process is exhausting, sending you commiseration.

Absolutely furious. The agent has just left and not updated us.

Feel manipulated. We set a deadline and he’s given us no update instead of telling us our arrogant buyers wouldn’t meet it, thus allowing it to elapse.

We told a buyer like this that unless they agreed the proper price by Friday evening it would be relisted on Monday at £10k more (rapidly rising market). They agreed.

Ok, he has now called back and they’re happy for us to fix it ourselves and stick to the asking price…

If they mess about one more time then ditch both them and the EA. Unfortunately I think they will try something else but I really, really hope not. Got my fingers and toes crossed for you. Good luck.