5K estate agent fee for BUYER on 220K house

katejo

dadsgoneshopping wrote: »

Is naming and shaming of the estate agents allowed on this forum?
If so, please do it to warn others.
If not

Would also like to name my local agents who are plugging this as a positive move in house sales.

tigsly

unlike a real offer your bid is an offer - you can still negotiate it down - once your background searches have been done..

googler

bouicca21 wrote: »

Can a contract that has been deliberately constructed to subvert the law really be binding?

Which laws does it subvert?

ging84

It's not going to be against the law, unless it is to deliberately mislead someone, be that the buyer, the seller or the tax man

It may not be legally enforceable as it may fail to have formed a legal contract.
If there was a pre-existing legal duty for the estate agent to put forward the bid to the vendor, then they may not have not provided a service in return for this fee
For a contract to be binding both parties must provide consideration, so each will perform an action or give something. If the estate agent already had a legal obligation to do the action in the contract, then they have not provided consideration, and therefore the contract could be invalid

bouicca21

If googler is correct that the estate agents act 1979 obliges EAs to pass on offers then a contract with a provision that enables the agent not to pass on offers is arguably unenforceable since it is designed to negate a statute. Not a crime but an interesting bit of contract law that I would love to see argued in court.

googler

bouicca21 wrote: »

If googler is correct that the estate agents act 1979 obliges EAs to pass on offers then a contract with a provision that enables the agent not to pass on offers is arguably unenforceable since it is designed to negate a statute. Not a crime but an interesting bit of contract law that I would love to see argued in court.

As I said earlier, the EA Act allows them not to pass on offers, IF the seller has instructed them not to.

If the contract with the seller has it written in that offers not using the buyer's form will not be passed on, that's an instruction for the purpose of EA Act 1979 ....

ging84

googler wrote: »

As I said earlier, the EA Act allows them not to pass on offers, IF the seller has instructed them not to.

If the contract with the seller has it written in that offers not using the buyer's form will not be passed on, that's an instruction for the purpose of EA Act 1979 ....

So it would be legal and possibly enforceable if, the seller agrees to request that the estate agent only pass on offers made using a particular buyers form
and then the contract is formed with the buyer to pay £5k for filling out this buyers form.

legal or not, it's an absolute scam

CreditCrunchie

Is this the same as "For sale by conditional offer"? I spotted one of those last week, googled it and was amazed at the audacity of some agents! A fee purely for their own gain so they don't have to wait for the sale to complete before they get their money. Avoid!

Dave_Ham

katejo wrote: »

There are now at least 2 agents in Walthamstow E17 using this tactic. You say it might be to hold onto sellers but it would put me off.
Our local MP isn't happy about it.

Sorry if my first post was misleading, I certainly do not agree with this "tactic" but was interested in the real reason they are attacking it this way.

It is another way to marginally increase the stamp duty mitigation for a property right on the £250k, but I think it is the long term capacity of the existing Estate Agents model changing

Did think East London agents would not be too slow to the party though!

jonewer

Estate agents are self serving money grabbing scumbags. We should not be surprised by their behavior.