Estate agent/house buying etiquette?

rileydog

We viewed a house today that is apparently a builders part-exchange, It's currently on with 3 different estate agents. We viewed today with agent A. It's a lovely house and if we can sell ours we definitely want to offer on it. Unfortunately I think we gushed a bit too much to the estate agent and told her our max budget (which is 5k below the 150k asking price).

From reading threads on MSE it seems that builders have in the past accepted much larger reductions than the 5k less than asking price we would offer once in a position to do so. I feel we've stupidly shown the estate agent all our cards financially and also said how we absolutely love the house so she probably knows that even if we were to offer say a cheeky 135k (once we have sold ours we will be cash buyers) we will definitely increase our offer to our max 145k as we really like the house.

So, is it out of order/unacceptable to view with a second agent and a) not tell them our max budget and b) not tell them we are crazy about the house! so that we can put the offer to agent B?

jimjames

If the house is on with multiple agents then there is nothing to stop you viewing it with another agent. Not sure on the situation for the agents if they are all marketing the same house but if you can get a better deal via a different agent and haven't already put an offer in then give it a go.

devotee

You can tell them the maximum budget, but that doesn't mean that's your maximum budget for THAT house. EA can advise the vendor to refuse your offer if they know you have more money to spend, but you can also refuse to increase your offer and walk away and let them sweat.
When I was selling and changing agents I got a letter with names of people who viewed my property and if any of them were to purchase my flat I would be liable to pay the commission to the agent who introduced me to those buyers. But with multi agency it's difficult to prove with whom you saw the property first.

maryjane01

You can do what you like, but as you don't know what the conditions of the contracts are between the vendor and the agents you may be putting the vendor in a difficult position if both agents demand their commission. I ended up in this position when I viewed and made an offer through one agent, then about 5 months later the price was dropped with another agent so we put an offer in through the new agent. When I mentioned that we had seen it through another agent a number of months earlier, agent 2 put another offer forward from a different buyer I am sure in a more favourable light than our offer to secure their commission, and we lost the house. The first agent were due their commission for 6 months after introduction.

kingstreet

I would imagine the builder has a multi-agency "who sells wins" contract and this means whoever arranged the first viewing will be entitled to receive the commission on the sale.

I wouldn't worry about your chat with the accompanied viewer. Make your offer and stick to your guns. What you want to pay for this property is the maximum you are offering for this property. What you can go up to has nothing to do with it. Agents work on builder stuff on a fixed low price and will be more interested in shifting it quickly at the price the builder can accept.

rileydog

kingstreet wrote: »

I would imagine the builder has a multi-agency "who sells wins" contract and this means whoever arranged the first viewing will be entitled to receive the commission on the sale.

I wouldn't worry about your chat with the accompanied viewer. Make your offer and stick to your guns. What you want to pay for this property is the maximum you are offering for this property. What you can go up to has nothing to do with it. Agents work on builder stuff on a fixed low price and will be more interested in shifting it quickly at the price the builder can accept.

Thanks, we don't want to cause problems for anyone and it isn't fair to offer with agent B if agent A (the one we blabbed to!) would get the commision so will probably do as you say and just stick to our guns on a lower price with agent A.