Threatening letter from unsuccesful buyer

toffe

Emmamumof2 wrote: »

Quote of above post "the o.p. was fair in what they did, the offer was a low one and therefore accepted on the understanding the house would remain on the market untill contracts were exchanged so the buyer knew the risk, took a gamble on getting the property for £10,000 less than the asking, that gamble did not pay off, boo hoo."



I dont think they were clear about the fact the house would stay on the market - they asked the EA not to tell the second buyers they were proceeding with the first buyer, that was dishonest.

No it wasn't it was a smart move, the buyer that came in had already backed out once so it was hardly a cast iron "agreed sale" to jeapordise the other offer by informing the other party of the competitor's re-entry into the race would have been a gamble, it could have made the other party up their offer and got them more money from a bidding war or it may have made them withdraw their offer and then the party who had pulled out once already could have messed them about again and left them with no offers and no sale.

the o.p needed to sell, they agreed no exclusivity on the offer and acted with their best interests in mind, the low offer buyer lost out on his gamble, he is owed nothing and if he did try to sue i'm sure the judge would throw it out, once he managed to stop laughing.

Milliewilly

Emmamumof2 wrote: »

Quote of above post "the o.p. was fair in what they did, the offer was a low one and therefore accepted on the understanding the house would remain on the market untill contracts were exchanged so the buyer knew the risk, took a gamble on getting the property for £10,000 less than the asking, that gamble did not pay off, boo hoo."



I dont think they were clear about the fact the house would stay on the market - they asked the EA not to tell the second buyers they were proceeding with the first buyer, that was dishonest.

In the first post the OP states it was made clear that the house would stay on the market.

The FTB solicitor has to take some of the blame too - the key paperwork was not moving from the seller to the FTB so the sale cannot have proceeded to contract stage.

It was OK for the buyers to try and get £10K off and if you want to go to the extreme - take advantage of a couple in a desperate situation to sell but they lost out on the sale and now are crying for £5K which is a gross exaggeration and indicative of the compensation culture.

Can I go back to my buyers at £249K from £265K who then knocked me down to £230K then pulled out because they found a different house they liked better and claim my £500 costs plus the difference in what I have now had to sell at (£15K) ? No - that's part of the process in England whether you like it or not.

Doozergirl

Milliewilly wrote: »

No one on here thinks twice about advising buyers (particularly FTB) to haggle down the price then haggle down on survey and basically screw the sellers down as much as possible. The FTB is basically peed off that they have not been able to buy a bargain.

Buying and selling a property is about negotiation. And it's right to renegotiate after survey if that survey is not what you expected. You can't be expected to take on the additional cost of things you didn't know about. So it's not an easy process and it does fall away sometimes when people are faced with the enormity of that, but we would condem people that actively gazundered a vendor as much as a vendor that gazumped a buyer.

I would advise every buyer on this board to get the lowest price possible, barter hard, wait as long as possible between offers etc. And in the next sentence I will advise a vendor to stand firm, reject offers quickly. It's not double standards, it's trying to help the individual that asks.

So if someone did come here and tell us that they'd deliberately gazundered you and then pulled out anyway, I am absolutely positive that the reaction would have been the same. And can you ask for the money you spent? Well yes you can appeal to their better nature, but is evident that in some cases that the better nature doesn't exist; they wouldn't have done what they did to you in the first place.

Emmamumof2

Milliewilly wrote: »

It was OK for the buyers to try and get £10K off and if you want to go to the extreme - take advantage of a couple in a desperate situation

How desperate could they be, yes they are out of work, but they have no mortgage and an income of £1,500 pm, which isnt really the point, but its hardly being on the brink - how would they have felt if the FTB's had been their children - what advice would they give to their own if they were in the position the FTB's were - would they be happy or would they empathise and see their point of view?

Catblue

Why is it that someone who behaves poorly never expects others to behave poorly in response? They just never see it coming - they think they are the only ones allowed to be cheats and liars for some reason. A sense of entitlement and a severe lack of self-awareness is probably at the heart of it.

- What the OP did was not illegal, but disrespectful and distasteful.

- What the unsuccessful buyers did in writing a letter to comment on the OP's behaviour was similarly not illegal, but might be disrespectful and distasteful.

The OP does not get to act shocked, outraged and call herself a victim when she is confronted by behaviour that was entirely prompted by her own poor behaviour.

toffe

Catblue wrote: »

Why is it that someone who behaves poorly never expects others to behave poorly in response? They just never see it coming - they think they are the only ones allowed to be cheats and liars for some reason. A sense of entitlement and a severe lack of self-awareness is probably at the heart of it.

- What the OP did was not illegal, but disrespectful and distasteful.

- What the unsuccessful buyers did in writing a letter to comment on the OP's behaviour was similarly not illegal, but might be disrespectful and distasteful.

The OP does not get to act shocked, outraged and call herself a victim when she is confronted by behaviour that was entirely prompted by her own poor behaviour.

Boarderline illegal and if it continues very illegal. Already it's harrassment, there is no contract or legal statute under which this person could claim to legitimately be pursuing the o.p for compensation so sending letters demanding money is harrassment.

If the person sending the letters includes any threats if the money is not paid then your straying into an attempted extortion and demanding money with menaces, two vey illegal practises.

If i was the op i'd make them aware of this in writing then if i got any more threatening letters or demands for money i'd hand it over to the police.

Milliewilly

Emmamumof2 wrote: »

How desperate could they be, yes they are out of work, but they have no mortgage and an income of £1,500 pm, which isnt really the point, but its hardly being on the brink - how would they have felt if the FTB's had been their children - what advice would they give to their own if they were in the position the FTB's were - would they be happy or would they empathise and see their point of view?

The FTB's tried it on for £10K and lost out to a higher bidder knowing the property was still being marketed and the risk that entailed simple as that. There is an overwhelming symapthy on these boards for FTB's but its the big bad world out there and the OP is not a charity to help a FTB on the ladder. The highest offer won out and thats that.

If the FTB's had been posting on here about they got £10K off asking because the couple selling were in ill health and desperate would there have been people saying they should have paid asking price? No. They would have been saying what a great deal they had done and FTB's have it so hard etc etc.

hermum

I was in virtually the same situation myself 3 years ago. Ill health had me off work for months & I needed support from family so had to sell my house & move closer.
I accepted an offer of I think £116k for a house valued at £135k as I wanted a quick sale. It was a retired woman buying it, who was the biggest pain in the butt I'd ever encountered.
Before accepting her offer I asked the EA to ask a young FTB who had viewed if they were likely to be making an offer & said that I would give them a week to decide, there was no response from them & so I accepted her offer. The following day the FTB's came back & offered me close to the asking price, I declined as I had already accepted the other offer. (It turned out that they had been on holiday when the EA had called their landline)
Boy did I need that extra money, but morally in my mind it would have been wrong, no expenses would have been incurred at that point, or very little.
I always try & treat people how I would like to be treated.
While looking for property to buy, on a couple of occasions I've been told that an offer has been accepted but the property is still available for higher offers, I haven't even looked at them, as to me it's morally wrong to gazump someone.
You don't know how many times that this may have happened to those buyers.
I don't see this as business, you are a private individual dealing with another private individual.
You are better off by £10k then if you had honoured the accepted offer. If you could stand to lose that then, surely you could pay for their expenses.
You never know it may even make you feel good about yourself.
I do hope that I'm never in a burning building with you or someone of your ilk, as you'd no doubt be tripping others up to stand on their backs to reach the windows to escape.
Of course, your bad knees would stop you from kneeling down to help others.
Karma, you'd better hope that you're never in the position where you have to sell your property, as there are an awful lot of unscrupulous vendors out there.

Soubrette

Milliewilly wrote: »

It was OK for the buyers to try and get £10K off and if you want to go to the extreme - take advantage of a couple in a desperate situation to sell but they lost out on the sale and now are crying for £5K which is a gross exaggeration and indicative of the compensation culture.

Sorry Millie, not picking on you in particular but wanted to pick up this point - there is a difference between negotiating and concealing.

We do not know the position of the buyers and how desperate or not they were and frankly the thought that ripping off folk using the justification that they might be in a better financial position than me is something I find distasteful.

Sou

Milliewilly

Soubrette wrote: »

Sorry Millie, not picking on you in particular but wanted to pick up this point - there is a difference between negotiating and concealing.

We do not know the position of the buyers and how desperate or not they were and frankly the thought that ripping off folk using the justification that they might be in a better financial position than me is something I find distasteful.

Sou

Agreed but there is a glaring lack of competency by the FTB solicitor here regardless of what the OP did. If the paperwork was not moving in their direction how could they possibly think the sale was proceeding to a point where shock horror someone else has bought the flat & that's angered them so much they have super sleuthed the OP down and are sending nasty demands for £5K?