Warning: house buying is expensive

MushyPeas

Hi all

Sorry to put a dampner on things, but just want to share my FTB experience, as a warning to others. When you are looking to purchase you first house, make sure you budget for at least £3-5K in case your first few houses fall through. In my case:

House 1
Vendor and EA said it didn't have mundic block, had it tested, house was riddled with it. EA and vendor had a copy of the previous test, which had showed the same, so also lied - loss of £1K

House 2
On the market since June '05, viewed Jan '06....took a long time to go through but vendor ready to exchange 3 weeks ago...didn't happen (the house she was buying fell through)...then no-one could contact her for 3 weeks...today walked into EA to say she was pulling out - loss of £3K

I'm a FTB and never would have thought I would lose this much money. I am totally disolusioned (sp?) by the whole house buying process and am now licking my wounds, not sure if I ever want to buy.

Just wanted to share my story to warn people that you need to budget incase it all goes horribly wrong, from no fault of you own. You can lose a lot of money.

Good luck all house buyers and sellers

MP

Debt_Free_Chick

Can you give us more details of these costs please? They look horrendously high for properties that didn't complete! What on earth did you spend £3k on for house no 2?

lynzpower

Surely if the EA lied to you on property one, then you can sue them under the misrepresentation of property regs people mention here?

Wickedkitten

This is why it's a good idea to go through a broker that offers you your second valuations free if your first ones don't carry through to completion and a no sale, no fee solicitor.

VickyA_2

A couple of my friends have had to pull out of two sales recently which has cost them £2k in total. Luckily they're moving into their new house on Thursday......

As it is, OH and I are FTBs trying to find a property to buy and I'm petrified that the money that the money that we've put aside as a deposit will be eaten at by money that we lose.

lynzpower

wait for hips, wait for hips...

miaxmia

Debt_Free_Chick wrote:

Can you give us more details of these costs please? They look horrendously high for properties that didn't complete! What on earth did you spend £3k on for house no 2?

Ditto - when buying your first home the biggest cost is the stamp duty, which you won't have paid if you didn't complete. My daughter's solicitors fees were less than 3K including stamp duty of £1615 (on a house costing £161,500) a couple of months ago.

silvercar

I agree with OP.

On the first house (that didn't go through) we spent £600 on survey & mortgage application fee and £450 legal fees (including searches).

On the second house we have spent £300 on mortgage application, £1100 on structural survey, about £400 so far on legals. The chain got into problems so we have decided to buy out the bottom of the chain (either we spend more or lose what we've already spent) so another £770 on mortgage and survey plus £2-300 legal fees.

Jorgan_2

lynzpower wrote:

wait for hips, wait for hips...

HIPS won't solve all the problems. The majority of people will still employ a solicitor to go thru the contnents of the pack, incurring costs, they may want to have their own survey done, incurring costs, vendor changes mind or circumstances change & withdraws from sale, buyer has stilll incurred costs & has no property to show for it.

HIPS would certainly help in the case of property 1, if their was an issue with the property, the buyer would know about it before spending any real money.

OP, if the EA mislead you, i.e. if they had knowledge of a problem & you asked them a leading question, which they failed to answer honestly, they have breached the PMA.

MushyPeas

Hi all

Thanks for your messages. You would have thought that you were all correct about reclaiming fees for the first house, but I have spoken with my solicitor (who is very good and very experienced) but EA can still get away with doing this! Basically they can refer to something they write on particulars; 'information provided by the EA is based on that of the seller, the purchaser must check with their solicitor that details are correct'. Awful, isn't it? The EA I used is not part of the ombismund, or whatever they are called.

Fees as follows:

House one
Mundic block search £700
Start of searches £300
Solicitor fees £200

House two
Mundic block search £700
House survey £550
Mortgage application fees £300
Mortgage arrangement fee £250
Searches £450
Solicitors fees £630 (estimated)
Will £100

As a FTB I might have got this wrong and won't have to pay for all of the costs above, but those underlined have already been paid for so I'm assuming I won't get those back.

Jorgan_2

An EA has to prove due diligence when providing information. They have to show what steps were taken in obtaining & verifying the information & whether there was any reason to disbelieve the information they were given.

For a disclaimer to be effective it must be bold, precise & compelling, that is the description itself must be effectivley brought to the attention of any person it is directed at.

General disclaimers at the end of an agents set of details will generally not be effective for the Property Misdescriptions Act 1991.

A false or misleading statement can be made in the following ways:
written, spoken, pictures, photographs, other means of conveying information (internet, editiorials in papers) & models (generally new builds).

If you asked the agent a question in relation to the Mundic Block & they had a copy of a report on that property & they did not answer your question honestly, they have breached the PMA. Your local Trading Standards Office is the place to go if you wish to take this any further. The agent doesn't have to be part of the OEA or NAEA.

This is the situation in England & Wales, it may be different in Scotland.