House Selling: Giving notice to estate agent.

Sponge

My house is up for sale with a local estate agent. The contract is sole agent and we're about 10 weeks into, what I thought was, a 12 week contract. We're not 100% happy with how things are going so are looking into serving notice to cancel. The contract states we need to give 14 days notice. It's a little ambiguous as to exactly when notice can be served.

Going by what was told to us when we signed, i.e. we're tied in for 12 weeks (not 14 weeks), we concluded we could give our notice at the 10 week mark. However, when we called the EA they have said we can only give notice after 12 weeks have run. Effectively turning the 12 week contract into a 14 week one.

I've been on the internet and it looks to me like any contract that is ambiguous is usually interpreted on the side of the person that didn't write it. Also, the OFT ruled against such ambiguous terms being used:

http://www.oft.gov.uk/news-and-updates/press/2006/116-06

Following referrals from Which?, the OFT has secured the amendment or removal of a number of unfair terms from the contracts of 25 estate agency businesses. The terms in question breached the Estate Agents Act, the Estate Agents (Provision of Information) Regulations and the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations. Amongst the terms found in a number of the contracts were

Terms that were unclear as to the duration of the contract period because of the termination provisions. Contracts were often stated as being for a minimum period of, for example, 12 weeks. However, the contracts were also subject to 14 days cancellation notice after that minimum period, in effect extending the duration of the contracts by a further two weeks.

I will post a copy of the contract, I know the wording is important, but it'll have to wait until I have access to a scanner later this evening.

I'm guessing this is a generic term used by EAs. Generally speaking, is it the case that 2 weeks notice can be given at the 10 week point?

Skaip27

Yes wording is very important here and you'd definitely need to state the exact wording to make a proper judgement. Often however you would have to provide notice set to expire at the end of the 12 weeks, i.e so at the 10 week mark.

I too am very dissatisfied with my EA, but unfortunately tied into a 20 week contract!