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My parents are selling their house for 450k, and their realestate agent will take 5% commission which is 22,000! Now that Me and my husband is planning to buy my parent's house, I don't want to give that agent 22k, because We won't need to advertise it, or an open house. We are a young couple but we have my mother in law as back up guarantor. If we are approved by the bank for a loan, can we just pay a 1 or 2% to the agent because I don't think he will be worth 22k since there's not much work to be done. I don't have any idea about the process an agent does to sell a house but giving him 5% commission doesnt feel right to me. Please give me advice how to save up and what are the fees we will be paying in order for my parents to sell the house and me to buy it. Thank you in advance.
I'm afraid drains leading across properties are very common and you may not be able to spot the deeper ones, which could seriously hinder extensions etc. These are matters people would do well to investigate themselves, because although they're typically not an issue, you can't expect a solicitor to check them out fully. For example, our septic tank was jumping between gardens according to the title documents, and yet no one had ever queried that in 35years....till we arrived!
With regard to shade, start by looking at who's in charge of the sunlight when you look at any property. Sometimes the aspect is just wrong, but on other occasions it's neighbours' trees that can suck the very lifeblood from your garden. You may not be a gardener, but one day your potential buyers might be, and everyone like a bit of sunshine, both in the house and especially on a patio on those (rare!) summer evenings after work.
Also, although solar panels aren't mainstream yet, the same thoughts apply.
In the UK you don't need an agent at all to buy or sell a house, especially to family members!
If this was in UK (it's not so don't take this as gospel) the agent would only be entitled to his commission if he introduced the buyer to the seller. If this is your parent's house then I doubt you were introduced to them by the agent.
You must have a similar site to this in Canada, go and ask there.
If you want advise on how things work in Canada, I'd suggest googling for data specific to your country. This is primarily a UK forum.
Try
'FSBO Canada'
'FSBO (enter your province, city or region)'
in a google.com search, or google.ca if there's a regional version for Canada
I think that you are in a very very very tiny set of buyers here (and hence there is a very limited readership for advice appropriate to you)
People in your situation are either looking for a property to relocate to, in which case the sensible choice is to rent for the first six months of the relocation and then do the search for a property to buy when having arrived full time.
Or are looking for an investment/holiday property in a second country in which case the costs that you have indicated are probably inevitable.
(Noting that you are from Sweden you do realise that we don't have the restricted rental market that you do at home?)
tim
My house was for sale in November 2012 and my solicitor handled the sale up to the contracts being signed but not exchanged. The buyer then said she'd changed her mind! I found another sale in December and we are yet again at the same stage. My solicitor has charged me £618 + vat for the first sale and £600 + vat for the current sale. Do you think I ought to be paying the full amount twice?
But if you are buying in London or surrounding area, if you try to follow all the advise you won't go anywhere because someone else will come and offer 10% over asking price without examining anything!
yep............