Keeping for sale property on market after accepting an Offer

You withdrew on the day before exchange? Did you not issue an ultimatum as regards agreement on a completion date? He wasn’t messing just you around, everyone in the chain was being messed around - and you pulled the plug on all of them.

Firstly I wouldn’t accept an offer from someone who didn’t have a complete and short chain and then I would insure my legal fees. Secondly, if I make an offer which is accepted, it’s on the condition that marketing ceases immediately. I then check. If I find that property for sale anywhere 3 days later I will call and withdraw my offer- unless I see my wishes carried out there and then. Honestly I think you have to be tough because people don’t always mean what they say. And you have to be prepared for disappointment- but you can minimise your loss of money.

I know it’s off topic but something else that annoys me is when people are selling their house and not having a for sale sign displayed
The number of times we have searched in vein to view the location of a house before making an appointment to view with an estate agent is amazing

Very interesting but yes stressful we are just putting our park home on the market praying for a quick smooth sale added stress emigrating to Australia our family there one in Melbourne one in Perth we are hoping to rent my daughters house in Perth💕✌️

We haven’t had ‘for sale’ signs Lesley because we didn’t want any chancers, who would indeed have dropped in in vain.

Are estate agents not supposed to vet any person wishing to view a property eg have they a property to sell, provisional approval for a mortgage. I know they used to. If no longer their task, other than take pictures for Your Move, what do they do?

Estate agents usually ask for the name and details of your selling agent, and they check with them.

I think the seller should have the survey done & the buyer should be able to view- it. My DM paid for 4 surveys- all the houses fell through unfortunately at great cost to mum- last house she viewed she didn’t bother with a survey- luckily the lady selling gave mum a look at her old survey she had done when buying 6 yrs previously- all good, house is perfect

Unfortunately the buyer can’t rely on a survey commissioned by the seller unless the surveyor agrees in writing to have a duty of care to the buyer and to maintain professional indemnity insurance for x years. Few will do this without a significant payment, and why should they?

Sadly, in England, until contracts are exchanged, nothing is binding. I believe Scotland has a better system…….

No, Scotland doesn't have a better system because many sales go to sealed bids and because once accepted the offer is final, many people, particulalry young people trying to buy their first house, can end up paying for surveys and other searches for house, after house, after house, without ever succeeding in making a purchase. On one occasion I heard of a couple going through this procedure 10 times before finally succeeding in purchasing a home.

House buying is protracted and difficult and beset with problems, no matter where you are buying or how the local system works.

Germanshepherdsmum

Anyone making an offer on a property should insist that it’s immediately taken off the market if the offer is accepted.

Yes, absolutely.

We’ve had the opposite happen to us twice. We have found a buyer and so we have also found ourselves a new property. Then a couple of weeks before exchange of contracts, just when everything has been done, the buyer has come back to us and said they can only afford to pay a lower price, otherwise they’ll pull out. At this stage we haven’t wanted to lose our new property and all associated expenses already incurred and so reluctantly we’ve agreed to their new price.
We must have been unlucky because that has happened twice to us.

maddyone

Germanshepherdsmum

Anyone making an offer on a property should insist that it’s immediately taken off the market if the offer is accepted.

Yes, absolutely.

We’ve had the opposite happen to us twice. We have found a buyer and so we have also found ourselves a new property. Then a couple of weeks before exchange of contracts, just when everything has been done, the buyer has come back to us and said they can only afford to pay a lower price, otherwise they’ll pull out. At this stage we haven’t wanted to lose our new property and all associated expenses already incurred and so reluctantly we’ve agreed to their new price.
We must have been unlucky because that has happened twice to us.

My friend was selling a house in St Albans and said she was terrified that, right up to the last minute she was scared that the potential buyer would threaten to pull out of the sale unless the price was dropped by twenty thousand as it had happened to several people she had known.

In Scotland the seller pays for the Home Report (survey) and it is free for any interested party to view.

Can the buyer rely on it? Does the surveyor expressly assume liability to buyers?

This works both ways. Our first viewer offered the asking price and the agent took our home off the market. We progressed the sale to the point of booking the removal firm when our buyer became evasive and after being pursued by the agent, admitted that he was not going ahead with the purchase as he couldn't raise the funds. The owners of the house we were buying had put down a 3k, non refundable retainer on a property, and we had bought 10k worth of new furniture for our intended purchase. I had also sold and given away a lot of our old furniture. We also had to pay our solicitors fees and associated costs. So, when we do raise the energy to go through the selling process again, the house will remain on the market until completion. Once bitten etc.....

Germanshepherdsmum

Can the buyer rely on it? Does the surveyor expressly assume liability to buyers?

To be honest they are dreadful. Pages of standard text and 'get out of jail free' clauses for the surveyor. They don't move anything, some hardly move themselves.
The professionalism of the surveyor varies and the homeowner can have rather too much influence in setting the valuation.
It does state that the property is, or is not, suitable for mortgage purposes.
Prior to these surveys, potential purchasers would pay for the survey to be done and further interested parties got a discount. So the current system does save any prospective purchaser/interested party some money. A purchaser can if course instruct their own survey but if a house is popular the seller may not favour that buyer.
I haven't heard of any surveyor being successfully sued for misinformation, most of their wives are solicitors (l jest!)

You can’t rely on a survey commissioned by someone else unless the surveyor expressly assumes responsibility to you. There is really no substitute for commissioning your own survey. Money well spent.

Germanshepherdsmum

You can’t rely on a survey commissioned by someone else unless the surveyor expressly assumes responsibility to you. There is really no substitute for commissioning your own survey. Money well spent.

If you read a standard surveyor’s report, it has so many get out clauses, it doesn’t seem to matter if you commission the report or not. It would take an awful lot of money to pursue redress through the courts.

You get what you pay for, if you want a full detailed structural survey, it’s going to be expensive. Older houses are going to need maintaining, so are always going to need money spent on them unless they have already been refurbished.

If the survey or your suspicions highlight issues get an experienced builder to look in more detail, if major work is needed do not underestimate the cost, add 50% to the estimated bill.

I would prefer to get a structural engineer in before a builder, a builder has an interest in getting paid work from you and some will exagerate the problem with a house and quote for unnecessary work that he says is necessary.

I’m familiar with surveyors’ reports. They always contain caveats regarding not having been able to lift the carpets etc but if they are negligent professionals will often pay up rather than have the adverse publicity of a court case. They have indemnity insurance so it doesn’t necessarily all come out of their pocket.

I would like to see a change in the law to make sellers complete (and pay for) a survey that is independent and has insurance that covers the buyers. There could be clauses that allow for remedial work to be signed off if the initial survey flags up issues that the vendor then puts right, so that vendors don't have to keep getting the house surveyed. The survey could be valid for a set period and properly regulated.

When we last moved we paid for three structural surveys, as we were looking for an older property. On of them showed a ridiculous number of problems - so many that the surveyor told us that he would sell us the report without the insurance cover, as it would be folly to go ahead. One of the features of a small town is that everyone knows everyone else, and we subsequently discovered that that house had had several surveys done on it. The vendor knew it had structural problems but needed to sell. Whilst I can't blame him really, it meant that thousands was wasted by people hoping to buy, and who suffered disappointment as well as financial loss.

My son and DIL are currently buying their first house. The vendors are downsizing, and have nowhere to move to yet, but they accepted my son's offer (he has a mortgage in principle) and the house is showing as SSTC. My son said they seemed like decent people, and I have my fingers crossed that everything goes through - the last one they looked at ended in disappointment.

Moving is a stressful and costly business. I do think that a lot could be done to remove some of the stress, but I don't know how a system where nobody accepted offers involving a chain would work. How can everyone sell before offering on another property? As soon as you move out of the end of the market that attracts first-time buyers there will be problems with that.

I'm another who resents paying stamp duty. I am not at all resentful about paying tax in general (I feel that everyone should pay towards the society they live in), but this tax seems to me arbitrary, and I don't understand the logic behind its imposition. Someone owns something, someone else wants to buy it - why should they have to pay the government money to do so?

We have been there Doodledog, with the very unsuccessful Home Information Packs.

If home buyers don’t pay stamp duty - and I hate it as much as the next person - then the resultant black hole will have to be filled by taxes paid by everyone. At least one has the choice of whether or not to buy a property, and at what price having regard to stamp duty. I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if a Labour government increased stamp duty - the Conservatives lowered it - on the basis that if someone can afford to buy a house they are well off (VAT on school fees thinking).

I vaguely remember Home Information Packs. Why were they unsuccessful? It's a good idea in principle, surely?

Re Stamp Duty - I don't think the fact that without it there would be a hole in revenue is a good reason for keeping something unreasonable. Why not replace it with something fairer if we need more money? (What that 'something' would be will depend on perspective, so I'm not suggesting anything on this thread, as it will just attract comments on its viability or fairness, which isn't really the point).