To those selling in these difficult times

chickmug

cindiedunkley wrote: »

How do you know when something is going to go wrong?

For those of you who have had buyers pull out at the last minute etc, did you have any clues at all that something was going to happen?

I haven't had any problems with my buyers at all but I feel that moving our completion date back a week is almost temping fate. To be honest I have been twitchy since the day they made their offer. I think this is because after six months of viewings it was all too good to be true, and it still feels like that to a certain degree.

From my point of view, as a past agent, many sales that go wrong are not a surprise to us or the seller. However we always find the sellers are elated when the sale is first agreed but then slowly but very very surely start getting more and more paranoid.

This is at its worst in the period just before an exchange of contracts when some sellers imagine evey negative reason you can think of for it to go wrong. I've had sellers tell me very confidently how they know it will go wrong as they instinct is always right to find later in the same day contracts are exchanged.

I feel that it is important, for sellers and buyers, to talk regularly, after the 'agree to buy' stage, as it does offer both parties a mutual support that doesn't happen through agents or solicitors contact alone.

4Chickens

Chickmug

Thanks for your reply. I do feel a little better for it. I have had no contact with our buyers at all. It has all been done through EA and solicitors and I don't think that the solicitors fully appreciated that all three of us in the chain wanted to complete on 22 May. My solicitors were slow to get started and this has now impacted upon our buyer's solicitor. It just seems such a waste of an opportunity to move on a bank holiday. Do solicitors appreciate at all the planning and preparation required by buyers and sellers alike to achieve a completion date. I feel like solicitors don't have any empathy at all and just whistle along on their merry way shuffling paperwork until someone shouts down their ear.

pawpurrs

Hi all :hello:
Getting Nervous here, not heard anything from the buyers soliceters, yet or survey (but early for that perhaps) how long have others been waiting for their surveys to be booked in?
EA said they are still pushing it, but havent had a viewing for the first week in ages, may be a coincidence but I am not so sure.
Woodchip wallpaper, my bugbear this house didnt have any, but my old house had it everywhere when we moved in, we called it snot paper. It was holding the walls together, as they were anicent lath and plaster walls, so I just got really thick lining paper and papered over some of the walls and then wallpapered over the top. Others had to be replastered.
Sorry to hear your news CD, hopefully you will exchange soon. The last buyer who pulled out took ages to get her survey done, in fact didnt have it done before she pulled out, I think she couldnt get a mortgage in reality as she only had a 10% deposit.
Ourrac I know how you feel, the last ones to offer, I didnt clean as much as normal, as I was so fed up with it, and they were the ones that offered, but both DH and I are pretty OCD about cleaning so it was still very clean IYKWIM!
Its such an awful time isnt it, trying to sell. I have filled out the sellers forms, but dont think I will bother rushing them back to the soliceter untill they have booked the survey in.

elona

This afternoon while I was cooking- the beds were stripped for bedding being washed,clean washing all over the place being sorted out etc!!!!!

In short - place a tip!

The phone rang - EA - could someone come and view- in five minutes!!!!!!

"Er -No!!!"

Who in their right mind would think they could view a house in five minutes time- especially with kids finishing school in the next few minutes!

Eventually arranged viewing for Saturday morning when I will have had a chance to sort things out - and hopefully be civil!!!!

Their house is not even on the market!!!!!

Got so p****ed off and cynical I nearly said "Fine- let them come!"

It would have been the shortest viewing ever!!!!

Strapped

cindiedunkley wrote: »

How do you know when something is going to go wrong?

For those of you who have had buyers pull out at the last minute etc, did you have any clues at all that something was going to happen?

I haven't had any problems with my buyers at all but I feel that moving our completion date back a week is almost temping fate. To be honest I have been twitchy since the day they made their offer. I think this is because after six months of viewings it was all too good to be true, and it still feels like that to a certain degree.

Probably not what you want to hear but the people who bought our last house pulled out on the day of exchange from the house they were up until that point supposed to be buying. Needless to say we were extremely nervous & it would've served us right if they'd done the same to us.

Francesanne

pawpurrs wrote: »

Can I ask the average amount of viewings to sale, what sort of offers if any you are recieving?

My Mums bungalow went on sale today and we're just waiting for the estate agent to ring back and confirm a viewing for tonight.

oneeye1

elona wrote: »

This afternoon while I was cooking- the beds were stripped for bedding being washed,clean washing all over the place being sorted out etc!!!!!

In short - place a tip!

The phone rang - EA - could someone come and view- in five minutes!!!!!!

"Er -No!!!"

Who in their right mind would think they could view a house in five minutes time- especially with kids finishing school in the next few minutes!

Eventually arranged viewing for Saturday morning when I will have had a chance to sort things out - and hopefully be civil!!!!

Their house is not even on the market!!!!!

Got so p****ed off and cynical I nearly said "Fine- let them come!"

It would have been the shortest viewing ever!!!!

i agree it baffles me why estate agents do this oh hang on no it doesnt if they were driving all round town showing time wasters houses they cannot buy it sure would stop but they dont the home owner does there job for them so it dont matter

themaccas

When we sold last year, our first buyers pulled out within 4 days, we then sold it again after 6 weeks to a couple who had come and seen it 8 weeks earlier and had been waiting to sell theirs so they could buy ours. They never came back to view at all although we offered several times for them to come round but they said they had fallen in love with the house and didn't want to come round and tempt fate!! Not sure what they meant!! In the end all proceeded very quickly and smoothly although every day we expected the dreaded phone call to say the chain had collapsed. It never did fortunatly.

My friend put her house up 2 weeks ago and had an offer at the weekend, only£2.5K off asking price of £252,000!! Will be great to get to completion on that!

Good luck to all of you on the rollercoaster of buying and selling, it's one of the worst things ever and you have my love and support!! x

ourrac

Imp wrote: »

When I was buying, I would know almost straight away if I would make an offer on the house. If I didn't want it, I did walk around out of politeness, but that was it. It wasn't tire kicking, and we did eventually buy something.

Hi Imp
I didn't mean to offend genuine buyers like yourself,I agree that often you know straight away about a house.
My problem is with people who have no intention of buying anything and view houses as something to do on a weekend.
It also peeves me to say the least when E/As send people round who are looking for something completely different to my house just so they can say they've sent viewers.
We've recently had quite a few viewers who are barely here for 2 minutes (no exaggeration) who go on to say ' the rooms are too small '.
I just wish they would actually read the EA details which list all the measurements and also have a floor plan and pictures of most rooms as this might avoid all the stress and hard work.
It's not just a quick sweep round and polish, even if you keep your house clean and tidy I'm sure most people will give it an extra going over for viewers. It doesn't help that I have a very large dog who is constantly moulting and slobbering everywhere so I'm cleaning up to the very last minute.

ourrac

pawpurrs wrote: »

Hi all :hello:
Ourrac I know how you feel, the last ones to offer, I didnt clean as much as normal, as I was so fed up with it, and they were the ones that offered, but both DH and I are pretty OCD about cleaning so it was still very clean IYKWIM!
Its such an awful time isnt it, trying to sell. I have filled out the sellers forms, but dont think I will bother rushing them back to the soliceter untill they have booked the survey in.

Hi Pawpurrs, that might be an idea !!! If I don't clean as much next time maybe we'll get lucky lol