I'm now being sued by the purchaser

thesaint

Rainbowgirl84 wrote: »

The buyer refused the sellers offer of a repair which is not reasonable. If I buy a 10 year old car and it breaks down on the road home and the seller offers to get it repaired do you think I'm entitled to a brand new car, the cost of a hire car, my fuel costs and a few hundred quid for my distress? The three options open to the seller were repair, replace or a partial refund. The buyer cannot force the seller to pay more than is necessary to provide a remedy. The options were a £300 repair, £2k off the house price and now a £4.5k replacement claim.


I repeat the buyer refused a reasonable remedy.

There was no reduction offered.

Let's say that this car was advertised as having a working air-con unit.
You point this out to the seller, and he offers to fix it, but you decline, and he won't take any money off the price.
He then sells it with the paperwork saying it has a working air-con unit.

You then take him to court. Do you think a judge would award you the cost of repairing the air-con? I do.

ThePants999

thesaint wrote: »

Like I said, I am a complete amateur in regards to house sales, but in my eyes(and the purchaser in this instance), the seller is responsible for the property until it has changed hands.

Yes and no. The seller is responsible for ensuring that the property is in the same condition at completion as it was at exchange. At exchange, the buyer is considered to have accepted the property in its current condition.

Miss_Samantha

ThePants999 wrote: »

At exchange, the buyer is considered to have accepted the property in its current condition.

And that was with a working boiler as per documents.

Rainbowgirl84

thesaint wrote: »

There was no reduction offered.

Let's say that this car was advertised as having a working air-con unit.
You point this out to the seller, and he offers to fix it, but you decline, and he won't take any money off the price.
He then sells it with the paperwork saying it has a working air-con unit.

You then take him to court. Do you think a judge would award you the cost of repairing the air-con? I do.

There was a remedy offered which the buyer declined...the choice of remedy is in the hands of the seller as the cost of the remedy should not be disproportionate. The buyer declined to have it fixed at the sellers expense! What do you think a Judge would think of that?

thesaint

Rainbowgirl84 wrote: »

There was a remedy offered which the buyer declined...the choice of remedy is in the hands of the seller as the cost of the remedy should not be disproportionate. The buyer declined to have it fixed at the sellers expense! What do you think a Judge would think of that?

I have said it a few times in this thread. Please read it to avoid asking me questions that I have answered over and over again.

The seller should not have "offered" to fix the boiler, he should have fixed the boiler as per the legal documents he signed that said it was working.

If the seller had reduced the price(as you had mistakenly thought, but not addressed when corrected)then I can see a judge making a different conclusion.

Sjmb

thesaint wrote: »

As stated already, the seller doesn't need to "offer" to fix something they claim is working. They have signed to say it is working already. Once they were on notice that is wasn't working, they should have fixed it.



The seller knew they were selling a house with a non functioning boiler that they claimed in writing was functioning.

At the point they were notified of a faulty boiler, they were no longer the legal owners of the property, so why do you think they were liable to fix a boiler belonging to someone else?

Why do you believe that the seller knew the boiler was not working?

Miss_Samantha

Sjmb wrote: »

At the point they were notified of a faulty boiler, they were no longer the legal owners of the property, so why do you think they were liable to fix a boiler belonging to someone else?

Of course they were still the legal owners: completion had not happened yet.

getmore4less

what is the time line?

Exchange?
First entry to the property to commence work?
Completion?
reasonable first expectation to use the heating/water?
Communication there was a problem?

KiKi

I agree the buyer sounds like an idiot, and I agree he knew what he was buying, and I agree he should have accepted the offer to fix it. I agree that £4500 sounds ridiculous.

However. Whilst the OP signed the form believing it to be true, they then found out it was no longer true. So the fact is they completed *knowing* that the form was no longer true, and on that basis the buyer may have a point.

So for me it comes down to this: legally, did the form need to be true at exchange, or at completion? If it needed to be true at completion then the buyer could have a case.

But yes, buyer is an idiot.

Argghhh

i think people are missing the point that the buyer had access to the property in between exchange and completion and also did work installing or replacing a radiator on the heating system. No court is going to find against the seller if the hating system was tampered / worked on