Buyer threatening to pull out.

Honeyapple

Hello

A little bit of history. We have sold our house and was purchasing another. Day before exchange our new home we were buying the seller pulled out stating that they had simply changed their mind!!

We are still actively looking put in an offer on another property today and are waiting to hear.

Now our buyer is an investor and is buying to let. His mortgage offer is only valid for 3 months. He is adamant that he doesn't want to reapply. He is saying that if we don't find anything or complete within 3 months he will pull out. He wants us to rent our property from him. I really don't want to rent as we could be paying off capital on our mortgage. Estate Agent is pressuring us to give an answer.

Advise, do we just get him to pull out and resell to someone else? Or perhaps wait?

Thanks

GDB2222

He may be adamant, etc, You may lose him as a buyer. But don't forget that the object of this exercise is for you to move home. So, you don't want to sell unless you have somewhere to move to. So just say no to your buyer.

moneyistooshorttomention

He may not "want to" extend his mortgage offer. Tough. He has to either extend it or lose the house. He wants jam on it if he wants you out exactly when it suits him on the one hand, but to have you to stay put providing him with tenants to start with without him even having to make the effort to find said tenants on the other hand.

Call his bluff and continue with your plans.

It may be that he really does pull out. Worst case analysis he does so = you put it back on the market and find another buyer.

Don't let him push you around for the sake of what will hopefully only be a few weeks until you are "ready to roll" with another house yourselves.

martinthebandit

I think it all depends on how good you think the price he is paying for your house is and how easy it was to find a buyer in the first place.

If you think you will have to drop the price of your house by a few thousand to find another buyer then it may be worth considering his suggestion.

To be honest it is a straightforward business decision really, I would suggest not letting personal feelings get in the way.

jimbog

If you were to be his tenants you would be 'locked in' for six months with a tenancy agreement

GDB2222

1. There's no need for a tenancy agreement to be 6 months in these circumstances.
2. I'd be more worried that it will be hard to find a place you want to move to, or prices increase whilst you are renting.

moneyistooshorttomention

jimbog wrote: »

If you were to be his tenants you would be 'locked in' for six months with a tenancy agreement

...and what's in it for you? (ie would you pay a lower rent because he hadn't had to make the effort/expense to find his first tenants)?

hcb42

don't do it...!

What's the betting he drops his offer right before you exchange. Do the right thing for you, which isnt renting your own house back!

moneyistooshorttomention

It seems to be a pretty common thing for investors to do exactly that, ie try and gazunder on the agreed price just before exchange of contracts. My EA certainly told me that an investor would be much more likely to "try it on" to do something like that than a home-owner would and I would need to hurry to move things through as fast as possible to minimise the chances of a try-on like that if I chose an investor as my buyer.

That was coupled with him virtually threatening to murder the last investor that offered on my place if they tried to do that to me (and I would have shut my eyes and pretended I hadn't noticed whatever comeback the EA staged on them for that;)).

So, I would say do be aware that investors are more likely to act unethical and do that "last minute gazunder" thing than homebuyers (not that some of them are immune to "trying it" from what I can make out ...but I think the chances are lower).

Ivana_Tinkle

How long is it since you accepted your buyer's offer? If you're already a couple of months in, I don't think it's too unreasonable of him to be making it clear he won't wait forever.

From his point of view, he has no way of knowing how actively you're looking, and for all he knows you might spend the next six months looking without finding anything you like. If you've already found another place to buy, surely you just tell him you'll do everything in your power to meet his deadline. (And if you can't then you cross that bridge when you come to it!)

moneyistooshorttomention

OP said they are looking to put in an offer "today" on the next place they have in mind, so it shouldn't be too hard to prove they really are cracking on with it in finding a replacement house to buy.