Your experiences (good & bad) with estate agents

lynzpower

A_Nice_Englishman wrote: »

A cynical person might suggest that your employer paid his staff a very low basic salary to encourage them to, shall we, say, be a little less scrupulous than perhaps you might be.

You were able to walk away and find another job. Other estate agents may not have been so lucky and may have had to indulge in some of the practices they are criticised for in order to keep a roof over their heads and feed their children.

Oh Im certain that the low basic was to improve productivity, altohugh I have to say, in the 3 months I was there, and working all the hours that I did, I never once saw/ heard any of my colleagues act in any way that would be called unscrupulous. And I did expect to

Most estate agents in london are on very low basics, its certainly not confined to my ex- employer. As an aside I aqpplied for other jobs with other companies, one of the managers said to me in a phone interview "other agents see themselves as proffessionals, I see myself as a wheeler dealer" - I just couldnt believe my ears!! I went oh right and then I never arranged an interveiw in person ( surprisingly!) :rotfl:

nearlyrich

Do what the person paying you asks for not what the person buying asks for if they clash, my EA put a sold sign on the house whilst I was on holiday ( I was sole seller) I had asked them not to put a sold sign on until contracts were signed. The buyer then messed me around for 4 months so I paid the EA 4 months after completion to make my point, they didn't like that.

THe EA who was selling this house was staffed by incompetent muppets, the house was reduced by £10K the weekend we spotted it but the staff said it was sold (why reduce and advertise a property that's sold?) My OH was really reluctant to view it, when I said I was going anyway he came and when we asked the vendor about the alleged sale she said they hadn't seen or heard from the person who put an offer in for 10 months! We fell in love and owned it within 5 weeks.

So my advice is:

1 remember who is paying and follow THEIR instructions.

2 Make sure you have all the facts right.

Good luck ....

reformedEffortMaker_2

great post!...im in the middle of a complaint against my estate agent so have lots to say

1) remember you are in people's homes!!...I refurbished my flat before marketing with magnolia walls, leaving ample space and mats in hallway for shoes to be taken off, one of the agents decided to let everyone walk throughout the whole flat in seriously muddy shoes (and something else that didnt smell like mud!)

2) do the viewings yourself!!....child care issues etc etc-are not an excuse for not doing viewings you are being paid to do!

3)know your buyers! I spent 2 months being mucked about by a couple who came up with various reasons why they hadn't got a mortgage sorted, in the end i gave them a deadline, and they pulled out the night before, I then found out that although they had made me take my prop off the market, they were still viewing!..and some of those viewings had been with my agent!, rightly or wrongly i blamed the agent for not 'managing' the situation better from the start, and promptly took my custom elsewhere

4) be on time!. I sometimes sat at a neighbours across the road to watch viewings on my flat, I was shocked at how many times the EA arrived late and had left potential buyers hanging around waiting for them

5) Make sure the sales progressor actually progresses the sale, harrasing solicitors doesnt count, as they will just start to ignore your calls-how about chasing the buyers to make sure they are returning paperwork promptly?

6) be professional about other agents, other members of staff, other properties on your books etc my agent repeatedly slagged off my choice of solicitor, I later found out that she had a 'special relationship' with a local solicitor and tried to get him as much business as possible-im sure there must be something illegal about that?!

7) no lies, I managed to get my buyers mobile number. We met in a pub and ironed out lots of issues which we realised were being caused by the numpty EA making assumptions on out behalf, and lying about it!

8) Kirstie and Phil state that there is still space for an EA at the negotiations stage, so from a sellers perspective, be good negoiators!...i had an EA keep me waiting overnight whilst they thought of a way to convince me to part with 10 yr old washing machine/fridge as part of the sale?!

and finally

9) dont employ pathetic teenage sixth form rejects to a) answer the phone, b) do viewings or c) relay offers. They are bad at it

Sorry for the rant, but EAs make me turn green!

rlc22

My advice would be to know how the whole process works...

I'm in the process of selling and I'm getting more than a little sick of hearing from my estate agent every week telling me how my solicitors are delaying everything by not doing things quickly enough etc. To put some perspective on it, I started getting these hassling calls about 3 weeks after I'd accepted the offer and before I'd even received a mortgage offer for the property that I am buying!

He seems incapable of realising that there's several processes involved in buying and selling and therefore things that everything is "delaying things" and thinks that it's all taking a long time (I accepted offer about 10 weeks ago).

The icing on the cake was when he told me that the buyers' solicitors couldn't do the searches as they didn't yet have the deeds. That's just a plain lie and I called him on it - he went very quiet.......

Hence my advice for knowing how things work - you don't want people calling your bluff

coal9011

Hey! ...... reformedEffortMaker, Don't talk about lauralla LIKE THAT!!!!

( 9) dont employ pathetic teenage sixth form rejects to a) answer the phone, b) do viewings or c) relay offers. They are bad at it

She sounds very proficient and "lovely" with it!

lauralla

Hey coal9011 - you are getting cheeky...!

Everyone else - thanks for your comments, its all appreciated.

BrixMorta

Why dont people do some research before instucting an agent. It seems they just wade in feet first then have a long list of complaints because they have chosen a dodgy one?

A_Nice_Englishman

BrixMorta wrote: »

Why dont people do some research before instucting an agent. It seems they just wade in feet first then have a long list of complaints because they have chosen a dodgy one?

How do you find a good one? Mine was a well-established local one, a member of the NAEA and the Ombudsman's scheme but still didn't seem to be aware of or compliant with the Code of Practice or the law.

BrixMorta

To be honest, the only way to be confident of their credentials is by recommendation or ask to see customer testimonials.

However, professionalism, maturity, experience, etc, doesn't seem to push sellers buttons when choosing an agent, its not until its too late that they realise how important this is.

madfrenchgirl

OK Lauralla,

As first time buyers, it took us one year from strating viewings to actually moving into our house. We have seen lots of different EAs all around. These are the few things that p'd me off during all that time and they come at random:

- don't insult a buyer's intelligence
When it is pretty obvious there are structural problems with the house (damp so present that the corner of the wall/ceiling has gone green with moss), do not say there is not.

- do not try to dump your unsellable properties on new potential buyers
It will only make them run away from your custom, thinking they are not taken seriously.

- do not try to make people believe that a very bad area is in fact a very good one
We knew from a friend that one area in particular was bad but we went to see this house anyway cos the EA kept on saying the street was ok. The dumped cars and the waste of our time told us everything we needed to know.

- try not to get houses rented by rooms on your books
When a fmaily or couple or single person rents out, they tend to keep things tidier and cleaner. Young professionals or students do not care and will leave the house in a mess. When you visit these kind of places, it tells you a lot about how your neighbours are likely to be.

- when in a painful situation, do not pretend you are going to call the person back the following day with some info
Need I say more? being jerked around is not a nice feeling.

- when using the bidding war thing, make sure you are talking to the right potential buyer.
I am not kidding, we had an EA coming to us saying "offers should start at xxx, gona call the other buyer now to tell them about it", to then call us straight after saying "well, I have just spoken to the other buyers, and they are very interested and their offer is xxx+1, are you willing to put in more?". While we did not actually put in offer xxx+1, we offered xxx and agreed with the EA to wait on what the others would offer first. Obviously, he was lying about the offers bing put in and driving the prices higher than they were and he was doing a bad job at it, getting the phone numbers mixed up. (I knew he thought he was talking to the other party, i just let him go on cos I was curious and malevolent).

- when a sale is dragging on and on and on because of a stupid old cow who did not bother getting one important legal paper sorted when her husband died and the problem is escalated to the head of branch, DO NOT AVOID ANY PARTIES WHEN THEY CALL, AND CALL THEM BACK
The direr the situation is, the more honest you have to be: Do not apply the oystridge policy, it will not go away by ignoring it but only gets worse.

- IF you have to recommmend a sollicitor, recommend a good one
and certainly NOT a "no win, no fee", based miles away from the sale, only delaing with customers by email whom you happen to have a "special deal" with. Remember that you cannot force people to complete a sale (change of heart) but you can make sure all the other factors and players are working ACTIVELY towards completion.

- Do not hassle potential buyers with seeing your mortgage advisor
Especially if they say that they already have one, already have a mortgage agreed in principle and that they need their IFA (please note, IFA not mortgage advisor) to be local to where they live currently (esp if it is 45 miles away form their potential new location).

- Do not hire people who look waaaay too young for their full suit
It only gives the impression that they are inexperienced lads who quit school after GCSEs and are trying a shot at being an EA. Even to a 24 yo, it is not regarded as pleasant to be nearly told what to do by someone 6 years younger or a young girl who has 3 different ones in her hair (it looks fashion victim not young and serious professional).

- Do not try the trick of "we already have an offer for the full asking price"
Especially when beforehand, the potential buyer has told you they lost the same house down the road and the price of that one (in better mint and with a working boiler contrarily to the one you are showing) was 15k below the asking price of the one you are trying to sell.

- overall, dont try to be pompous
If you do not know about something, admit it. Don't dig your own hole, people can see it.

- do not be pushy on your potential buyers
I once had this young girl EA who could not understand that my partner was doing the 1st viewings as his job was near our future home and I was 45 miles away and did not necessarily had te time nor the money (90 miles roundtrip for me on top of my partner's) to waste just for seeing the houses she could not sell (turned out they were terrible anyway).

This is a long post. And I wish you all the best, you sound like you are too much of a nice person for such an environment. If I ever want to be an EA, I would want to work with someone like you. However, I must admit that my top 3 list of most hated profession still remains in this order: Car Salesman, EA, Employment Agencies. All in all, LISTEN to what people want and you should be ok.