Last minute demand from buyer

elsien

Why is anyone even talking to the dad when he's not the one buying the house?

Alfrescodave

Seems to me that an £90 electrical check is a small price to pay to ensure that the sale goes ahead. Particularly as you will have exchanged contracts before this happens.

Hopefully you have not agreed, even verbally, to pay for any problems that this check might identify.

Kynthia

It's a pain you've had to pay £90 but it's a small price to pay to keep everything going at this stage. Now once you exchange they have to complete or fund your every expense and lose their deposit. Not a bad place to be really.

moneyistooshorttomention

Fathers can be over-protective sometimes.

When I was rather younger than now - my father had me gobsmacked when I heard him telling the vendor exactly what I would be paying for his house. I dont know who was more astonished - the vendor or myself! The vendor accepted the offer and that was it = deal done basically.

Which was followed by my father surreptitiously keeping the vendor "on track" to sell the house to me:rotfl:

It's what some fathers do....and not a problem as long as you dont "let his little girl down and refuse to sell the house to her after all". Some fathers can get rather upset about that.......remembers the house I "shoulda bought" and my fathers response to that let-down by that vendor...ahem........daughters sometimes find out what their protective father has done after the event....

So - now Dad has "made his presence felt" he's probably happy enough to stay in the background from here on in until he turns up for a repeat tour of inspection on moving in day and making mental notes of what tools he plans on coming round with shortly...:rotfl:

In your position - I'd stay with the idea of paying this £90 for the check, whilst being thoroughly puzzled as to why they wanted it after Exchange. But, as others have pointed out, by that point they will have Exchanged and worst case scenario would be you keeping their deposit and that's not exactly a problem:)

kinger101

The father sounds awful. Micromanaging his daughter's life, and making a mess of it to boot. I think it's a case of waiting to see where you are on Friday. The buyer will be contact with their solicitor before then, who'll probably point out their dad is an idiot.

EDIT: Is there an onward chain?

D_M_E

I agree that £90 is a small price to pay to keep the sale on track and I would also add that you instruct your solicitor to exchange with your buyer before the exchange with your own purchase takes place - in some cases it's the other way round, I got caught once by this, exchanged on a purchase but my buyer did not exchange until 2 days later which caused no end of grief waiting.

eddddy

Just a clarification about if the buyer backs out between exchange and completion (which I'm sure they won't) :


If the buyer backs out after exchange they will probably lose much more than their deposit. They will ultimately be responsible for the consequential losses of the whole chain.

This could be tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds.

TBH - the worst case scenario would be that the buyer backs out and goes bankrupt as a result, and leaves you to pay a massive damages bill from up the chain (which might bankrupt you).

But the buyer would have to be seriously, seriously stupid to choose bankruptcy because of a bad electrical report.

lichfield22

Everyone, I am so very grateful for all your advice and support. I've been feeling a little shell shocked since this all unfolded yesterday and wavering between thinking the £90 is a small price to keep things on track and thinking the buyer's dad is taking advantage!

In answer to questions - there is no onward chain with the house we're buying (vendors have been renting it out and don't live there), and we've agreed the sale completes before the purchase so we're not in a position where we've exchanged on the new house and THEN the buyer pulls out.

Totally agree that the dad sounds overprotective and is probably directing his anger at me because his daughter hasn't involved him to his satisfaction to date. You may all be surprised when I tell you the daughter is in her late 40s!

I have definitely not agreed to cover costs or renegotiate if the checks show the electrics need work (they will - I've been there since 2006 and have done no work on them so although everything seems to be working fine, they won't meet current regs). Had the buyer found these issues earlier in the process I would happily have renegotiated but not now.

Wish me luck everyone, and really thank you all once again. I'll report back on Tuesday as to whether we do exchange! Eek!

LittleMax

kinger101 wrote: »

The father sounds awful. Micromanaging his daughter's life, and making a mess of it to boot. I think it's a case of waiting to see where you are on Friday. The buyer will be contact with their solicitor before then, who'll probably point out their dad is an idiot.

EDIT: Is there an onward chain?

Clearly he s not micromanaging her life - otherwise he would have been involved from the off and survey would have been carried out at an appropriate time!

As moneyistooshorttomention explains, Dads can be very protective of their daughters. OP says he was surprised the Buyer hadn't had a survey, so sounds like the Dad is right, but has found out too late in the day. He is just trying his best to look out for his daughter, just not gone about it in the best way.

kinger101

LittleMax wrote: »

Clearly he s not micromanaging her life - otherwise he would have been involved from the off and survey would have been carried out at an appropriate time!

He called OP's agent to say the sale was off! Leaving her to call back in tears. She is in her 40s. That's not love.