Our sellers never instructed solicitor - can we claim?

Retail_Guru_2

4 weeks ago we had an offer accepted on the house we wanted to buy. It was vacant and the sellers were just about to rent it out due to no sale so pushed us for a quick decision, entered into discussion regarding price and a sale was agreed. They provided solicitor details to their estate agent etc so the process began. 4 weeks into the process I had a niggling doubt so asked our solicitor to make contact with sellers solicitor for update of state of play. Our solicitor suddenly realised they had had no contact from our sellers solicitor at all despite 3 letters to them from our solicitor. No draft contract, no fixtures and fittings list, nothing! I pushed the issue with the estate agent and the estate agents have now been told by one party of the couple selling that the marriage has broken down and she has been advised by her solicitor not to sell for 6 months. Furthermore, they never ever instructed a solicitor post offer accepted but did not tell anyone, not us, estate agent or solicitors. We are obviously out of pocket to the tune of £800 (pushing the sale due to the initial request from sellers on acceptance of offer to proceed asap) with the inference the sellers were not in a position to sell from the outset - hence no instruction within 14 days of sale agreed. Can I claim against either them and/or my solicitor who should possibly not have instructed the searches without a draft contract or at least initial contact from the sellers solicitor? I realise I am absolutely stuffed re the cost incurred setting up the mortgage and survey!!!

Doozergirl

How on earth do you incur a bill of £800 with no contact from the other solicitor?

Searches I understand, potentially a valuation fee but I'm presuming no valuation took place so you should get that transferred at least to another property. Your solicitor can't have done that much work with no co-operation from the vendor's solicitor.

The bad news is that you cannot claim anything back from the vendors

Retail_Guru_2

£800 easy gone - £300 up front to solicitor for searches, £200 for mortgage booking fee (i'm guessing this bits transferable) and £349 for home buyers report - oh yes valuation of property completed due to very efficient lender! Great - on review £849 down the pan - my day just gets better!

LuluBlue_2

I sympathise - something similar has happened to us today to about the same amount of money. Had our mortgage survey done and all was going along fine then the seller just changed their mind. :mad:

Cazza

Not much of a consolation, but if you still intend to buy another property, DO NOT cancel your mortgage application with the lender. Leave the application as it is and when you have found another property call them with the details. They will be able to use your existing application and therefore the £200 booking fee towards the next property.

In future, if you're given the choice, always add the booking fee onto the mortgage. If the lender doesn't have the money they can't keep it! If you don't actually want it added to the mortgage you can always pay it in full at a later stage, once things are a little more definite.

pawpurrs

Your soliceter must be useless not to have realised that they hadnt heard any thing from the other side, mine would be pushing after a week! So sorry but unfortunely its one of the downsides of buying as it stands at the moment.
I hope you find something else soon.

tbs624

Write to the managing partner/practice manager at your own solicitors office. They should have flagged up that they were getting no response to their letters.

Bufger

sounds like next time you need a better solicitor. To 'just realise' there isnt actually anyone replying to their letters or phonecalls is poor poor practice.

But thats housebuying/selling. You can end up out of pocket at any point until exchange.