Selling rented house.

WHATS_IT_ALL_ABOUT

Hello i have been renting my house out for 12 months and the tenant has just signed up with estate agents for another 6 months,but i have now decided to sell the house to the tenant.
We have agreed a price and now is in motion with the solicitors,
Where do i stand with the estate agents now i am selling the house i am not sure if there is any fees or if even i can sell the house untill the
6 months is up can the estate agents stop me selling my property?
has anyone got any advice thankyou.

WHATS_IT_ALL_ABOUT

anybody ??

caljoemor

Did you advertise the property for sale with an agent?

Did the current tenant renew the contract through the agent and did you have a contract in place with the agent for them to do this on your behalf?

caljoemor

I just re-read your post, is the tenant buying the house?

caljoemor

Ok apologies for not paying attention.

If your tenant is buying the house then I can't see there being a problem with the contract as you would both be agreeing to terminate it.

Now the agent - if you had a contract in place with them agreeing to pay them renewal fees for tenant when they signed a new tenancy then I think you may have to pay up as they have carried out their contractual duties.

Phirefly

Check your agreement with the agent. Its very likely there will be a clause in there which states that if you sell to a tennant they found, you are liable to pay them a fee.

We bought our house from the landlord and he was liable to pay the letting agents a 2.5% fee. Instead, we never let on to them we were buying it, he told them he wanted to cease letting it as a family member was going to move in. We then pretended to move out, had a final inspection from the letting agent then moved back in when the coast was clear.

Its a LOT to ask of your tennans/buyers to expect them to do this (also, the letting agent won't relaease their deposit till they've moved out and everything is satisfactory) so make sure you make it worth your tennants/buyers while to assist you in this.

tbs624

Phirefly wrote: »

Check your agreement with the agent. Its very likely there will be a clause in there which states that if you sell to a tennant they found, you are liable to pay them a fee.

We bought our house from the landlord and he was liable to pay the letting agents a 2.5% fee.

If a T has reached the end of their fixed term or is on a periodic and gives notice then such a clause *could* be open to challenge as the LA has not introduced the T to the property as a buyer, merely as a T.

JanCee

Not all LA's have that clause. We bought our rental property and the vendor didn't have to pay the LA anything.

We went ahead with the purchase and came to an agreement with the LL/vendor that they would refund any rent that we had paid prior to completion. Your solicitor should also insert a clause into the contract that cancels any rental agreement upon completion.

Edited to add - in our case the LA only did lettings and wasn't also an EA.

freeride

Hello, I let my house out, It states in my terms of business that the Letting agent would charge us 1% of the sale value if the tenant bought our house.

Not bad really considering and estate agent would charge more.


freeride

tbs624

freeride wrote: »

Hello, I let my house out, It states in my terms of business that the Letting agent would charge us 1% of the sale value if the tenant bought our house.

Not bad really considering and estate agent would charge more.

Except that the EA would have actually done something for their money. In this case your LA has introduced this person as a tenant to you, not as a purchaser.It could only be argued in the EAs favour if you originally had your house up for either /both sale and rent, & got a T who then decided to buy.

freeride

tbs624 wrote: »

Except that the EA would have actually done something for their money. In this case your LA has introduced this person as a tenant to you, not as a purchaser.It could only be argued in the EAs favour if you originally had your house up for either /both sale and rent, & got a T who then decided to buy.

Very interesting. We had our house up for sale and let at the same time in July last year. Anyway, we couldn't sell so we let the house out on 1 years AST. We have now sent a letter to the tenant asking if he wants to buy the house if it goes to market.

The way I see it is, if he buys it we have to pay the LA 1%, if we sell to someone else with another estate agent, we will probally end up paying1.3% or 1.5%.. I'd sooner sell to the tenant.