Gazumping - how common is it?

exil

Think it's a 50-50 situation myself. Buyers can mess sellers around, and vice versa.
Sometimes a buyer can faff around for weeks - they haven't put their own house on the market yet, they can't get a mortgage, etc, etc. In the meantime any number of potential buyers may have walked past your for sale sign.

I don't see why people who offer less than the asking price are surprised if they are gazumped. The AP is what the buyer really wants. TBH when I last looked for a house,
it didn't occur to me to accept a lower offer (though I did consider lowering the AP, which is IMO different), nor to offer less than the AP for the house I bought. Maybe it's a recent trend to do this.

Wickedkitten

We had already researched which solicitor we were going to use, and got a reference number, and got our mortgage arranged before putting our offer in. The offer was accepted on Tuesday and already the application has been sent off, the solicitor has been appointed, and the survey is scheduled for sometime early next week. Not only that but as soon as we got the application filled out we went directly to the estate agent and told them what stage we were at and what IFA we were using in case they needed to chase her up about the survey.

She actually seemed quite shocked that we had already managed to get all of that sorted so quick and that we came over and told her, plus they have already taken the property off their website and window.

Never hurts to keep in communication with the vendor as far as I'm concerned.

Tassotti

I concur with what you are saying...buyers...sellers..etc.

BUT if a price has been agreed (whether you reduced it or buyer offered less), you know the least price you would accept for the property), a good offer comes up, the buyer is in a position to move forward and has paid out for surveys and solicitors, then sell.

tesuhoha

We're getting our mortgage sorted out tomorrow and once we've paid the survey fee we're going to INSIST that the vendor takes the house off the market. We're usually the gullible ones to be ripped off so this makes a change for us.

backtomum

I'm really sorry to hear of your predicament - some people have no scruples. In certain areas where houses AREN'T selling [and believe me this is the case in a lot of areas] gazumping just isn't happening, but as I think the South East is enjoying a mini boom of lates - you are probably buying at an inflated price anyway. EAs are actively promoting gazumping, getting people in a frenzy, ramping up prices etc. Would it be possible for you wait a short time until maybe Summer as the market is always a little flatter then? Whatever happens I hope you can find somewhere soon [without paying a massively inflated price].