Being taken for a ride! Please help

hoglet121

Yes you are being had. Only you can decide if you're willing to accept that. If it was me the house would be back on the market on the 25th, leaving the country or not (speaking as someone who lef the country and knows all which that entails..)

As a side note, the vendors we bought our house from in NZ, who we had had no falling out with, turned the water off to all the toilets and left them with empty cisterns. In the weeks that the property was vacant, the valves all dried out and split - we moved in, turned the water on and gained 3 constantly leaking toilet cisterns.

That's just, y'know, for your information.....

pinkshoes

Offer to pay the £700, but tell them the price has gone up £750.

dirty_magic

We've just bought and I preferred being showed around by the vendors. EAs don't know anything about the house. The one we've offered on was shown to us by the EA, but it would have been nice to speak to the vendors.

OP I'd stand your ground. If they pull out their fees will end up being as much as the rent they have to pay. I know I wouldn't want to lose ours now!

I don't know why people can't just be decent and treat people the way they'd like to be treated. We will have a few months rent to pay too, but our vendor accepted our offer on the basis of a quick sale and we'll stick to it. I'd never ask her to pay our rent!

Nobbie1967

Give the agent the cheque, they exchange as agreed. Tell the agent to give you your cheque back. He's your agent and it's your cheque. If he refuses then cancel it. By then they're committed to completion and all they could threaten is legal action if they can prove a contract existed. Don't put anything in writing or tell the solicitor.

motherbored21

We have an overlap of rent and mortgage on our purchase, to the tune of £750. We don't hold anyone else responsible for this. We would have lost our FTB's, actually withdrew from our purchase because of vendors problems buying (whole other story!) and have now found somewhere else.

eddddy

ragle wrote: »

...
Firstly, they are not FTB. They are a middle aged husband and wife with 2 kids. Husband is an insurance broker/risk assessor and wife IS the solicitor doing her own conveyancing,
...

In which case, I retract my last post - they are very sophisticated purchasers who know exactly what they are doing. I would be very wary.

Now, my suspicion would be that they are testing the water to see how easily you give in. i.e. how desperate you are.

I doubt £700 is a particularly big deal to them. (Although, some people just enjoy the thrill of negotiating/haggling and winning. Even though they're not particularly interested in the actual winnings.)

So I think my strategy would be to say 'No' or perhaps reluctantly offer a reduced amount - to show them I'm not a pushover, but to let them feel they've 'won' something.

diesel100

you are repairing/servicing the boiler for the buyers?

why? was this a condition /outcome of their survey?

should only cost £50 for a service, to be honest one should always keep boilers services, but legal requirement for house sales.

paddyrg

Practically speaking, you don't want to risk the sale for £700, but you don't want anyone taking the mickey either. You could agree, but in return for another concession from them. It's possible to let them keep 'oh we're so clever' face and you not suffer too much. Maybe they have to buy your gardening equipment from you, or something?!

rpc

Are you in a position to exchange immediately after they are? Is your solicitor?

If so, it could be worth "we'll drop the purchase price by £700 ONLY if contracts are exchanged within 24 hours."

You get certainty, they get the rent paid by you. If they don't accept then I would respectfully suggest that they are chancers and your best bet is to put the house back on the market.

Don't muck about with cheques, it can all start to look fishy.

LandyAndy

DRP wrote: »

i'd really consider leaving something unpleasant under the floorboards and also in the loft if I was OP.

...

Plenty such things to choose from in this post on the 'what have vendors left behind' thread

My mother was going to downsize and initially move in with her sister so didnt want all the carpets, light fittings, washing machine etc and so approached the buyer to get at least a token offer for them as most were relatively new and he was a cash buyer wanting to move into buy to let (though never knew if ours was being bought to let or if they intended to move into ours and use their old property to let out - ours was the much larger property)

The official response we got back from their solicitor was "we dont want any of your old tat"

So left behind was 6 bed house worth of carpets, heavily soiled and a large number of red wine stains and cigar burns (all strangely occurred the night before we left).

One washing machine with a number of internal seals split. One dishwasher with a number of internal seals split and a 3L bottle of industrial detergent having been put into the system. One cooker with thermostats removed.

Two sets of secondary shelves/hangers inside built in wardrobes with a fresh (but not for long) chicken forced between the top of the unit and the built in wardrobe of both.

One small shoal of mackerel evenly distributed between the double radiators through out the house with the remainder in the loft water tank.

One 1940s sack barrow with one seized wheel.

One bottle of Tesco Value wine as moving in gift.

Obviously all very childish and could potentially have resulted in bills etc but was seen as a good way of venting frustration at the "old tat" comment and thankfully she never heard anything from the buyer afterwards