Forcing vendors to accept offer on repo?

rich-accountant

Hi,

As in some of my other posts, we had an offer accepted on a reposession.
The vendors then moved the deadline, and put it to auction as we were still waiting for our formal mortgage offer. We have since been back to the vendors saying we are ready, and can exchange in hours, however they declined our offer (due to the terms and conditions of the auction by the looks - see below)

The house is up for auction with REDC, the American company that has some bad reviews. Although the house will go very cheaply, the way they do auctions is not in the normal British sense.

For example, once the hammer goes down, the lender appears to have 15 days to decide to accept the final price (and the buyers auction fee is 10% plus VAT - so we have ruled going to the auction out)

Therefore, as our original offer was good, and likely to be more than the final auction price (due to the fact it is an auction and the buyers fee is 10% plus vat), can make our offer again after the auction? We understand that the vendor has to get the highest price possible for a repo, therefore can we inforce this?

poppysarah

Don't buy through them if they sound that dodgy.

Email watchdog about them. Should be warning the public about dodgy auctions

Doozergirl

This looks really wrong to me - I don't understand how lenders can be seen to be legally obtaining the best price for a property when the buyer's premium is 10% of the purchase price. All a buyer does is knock 10% off what they would be prepared to pay to cover the fees.

There seems to be 'chat' afterwards on financing which also seems pretty scary to me. You 'choose' your method - do they have people selling you products?

I did see one of their incredibly tacky adverts in the NOTW on Sunday (I buy the Times as well, honest!) and thought it was a scam tbh; evidently not.

If your offer is fair and the best offer at auction is lower than yours (likely) then your offer should be accepted eventually. What an absolute shame that you are ready to exchange.

Have you seen a HIP with the Land Registry documents with who the lender is that has the first charge? I can't imagine a mainstream lender using tactics like this to sell houses.


I'm not sure this is Martin's bag exactly, but someone needs to look at this. I'm actually tempted to write to my MP. I'm going to have a look and see if there's any houses in the constituency.

Doozergirl

Doozergirl wrote: »

TI'm not sure this is Martin's bag exactly, but someone needs to look at this. I'm actually tempted to write to my MP. I'm going to have a look and see if there's any houses in the constituency.

There is as well. One I've had my eye on round the corner!

PasturesNew

There are a lot of odd clauses with that auction company. There are posts going up all over the internet about their unusual practices/terms.

I'd go to the auction, out of sight, to see what happened... I'd let them crash and burn at the auction, then mop up the property afterwards cheaper.

mikthe20

Could be good news - go to the auction and then when/if the vendor comes back to you because they weren't happy about the auction price, offer them the auction price + £1. That's clearly the top offer. (of course this assumes the auction price is lower than your offer).

rich-accountant

Thanks all for the replies.

I think we will go to the auction to see what it goes for.

Yes it appears the valuations are very excessive. The house we made an offer on at £167k, is last valued at £230k. Our valuation also came back at £167k.

Therefore, the rational buyer at auction would only pay £150k, plus 10% = £15k, and a further £2,325 (VAT) = c£167k. The vendors are then only receiving £150k, £17,000 less than our offer!

So how can they show they got the highest price?! (Assuming no one pays more than the valuation of course).

poppysarah

Read the T&C carefully.

rich-accountant

No one can find the T&C's!

These are the problems we are having

poppysarah

Well you would be a fool to bid at an auction without fully reading them. Email watchdog. Seriously someone needs to look at this and get them to put the T&C online or not go ahead with the auction.

rich-accountant

Exactly my thoughts, and given what we have read, I have no intention of bidding at auction. The only reason I would go is to see what the final price was.