Is this a porky?

54druids · 23 June 2014 at 3:37PM

We have had an offer accepted on a house and are about to pay out a fair whack on a structural survey. The house says sstc on Rightmove and Zoopla but was wondering why it is still on there at all so asked the estate agent. The reply was that they couldn't remove it as it is linked to their system and they need to still see it. I suspect this is a bit of a porkie pie, am I right?

m_13 · 23 June 2014 at 3:46PM

It will probably be on there until you exchange. Our house is SSTC and is on there as is the house we are buying.

LEJC · 23 June 2014 at 3:46PM

Just because its still on rightmove does not mean its still being marketed....
I am in the process of purchasing and the property still remains on rightmove sstc...has been that way since mid march!!!

What do you want the EA to do?...do you feel it should be removed as you are the hopeful purchasers?

eddddy · 23 June 2014 at 3:51PM

Hi 54druids

A property can be removed from Rightmove and Zoopla within a couple of hours, if the agent requests it.

But it sounds like the EA have an internal policy not to do this.

EAs sometimes like to 'show off' how good they are at selling properties, so they like to have lots of sstc properties on Rightmove. Perhaps that's the real reason behind this.

thesaint · 23 June 2014 at 3:54PM

So it seems like you have put nothing down yet wonder why the property is still on a search engine even though it has correctly been labelled "Sold, subject to contract".

agrinnall · 23 June 2014 at 4:28PM

Can't argue with what thesaint has said, once you exchange and have a commitment to buy you might have cause to request removal of online listings, but until then the vendor is perfectly at liberty to entertain other offers should another potential buyer insist on their offer being put forward.

SG27 · 23 June 2014 at 4:33PM

Yep it's a lie.

But agents generally leave it on there as SSTC until contracts are exchanged anyway so don't worry.

G_M · 23 June 2014 at 5:06PM

54druids wrote: »

We have had an offer accepted on a house ....

The house says sstc on Rightmove and Zoopla

What is the issue?

A sale has been agreed.

Contracts have not been exchanged.

So the property is, in fact, 'sold, subject to contract'.

So showing it as such on websites is accurately describing the position.

I'm on the estate agent's side on this one. For once.

Paully232000 · 23 June 2014 at 5:33PM

i wouldn't worry about that too much, sure will be more important things to worry about in the house buying process.
our house was still listed as sstc for at least 3 months after we moved in.

ToeDipper · 23 June 2014 at 6:14PM

Our flat is still flagged as SSTC - and we completed in November last year!

I quite liked having the details up on the web whilst we were buying, because it meant I could email the link to people who were interested in what we were buying, and I could continue to gaze at our new home and visualise everything we were going to rip out ...

I have thought about asking them to take it down now that it really has been sold, but it just doesn't bother me enough to make me get round to it.

cloo · 23 June 2014 at 6:32PM

I wouldn't be alarmed at that. As has been said, some agents like to keep up their SSTC properties because it's good marketing to show what they've sold (not just how good they are at selling, but also the kind of thing they're selling), so it's pretty usual.