Help!.. property misrepresentation!

T3RRY

Hi all,
Just joined the site and am looking for a bit of help on this matter. (Apologies, it is a long post)

We are in the process of buying a house and have not exchanged contracts yet.

The property has parking at the rear that was created by moving the garden fence inwards, this was also advertised by the estate agent - "parking at rear". During our enquiries, We asked the seller if they had permission for the hardstanding/parking at the rear. To our surprise the seller responded through our solicitors stating "what parking". I then went onto the estate agents website and notice the agent have removed all references to the parking from the site. (Covering their act)

I still have four different copies of the advert -PDF & two print outs plus the one we were handed over when viewing that all clearly state parking at rear.

What are my options on this one? Who do we Chase after on this? We have already got the mortgage offer and going back to the bank if offered a discount will require further credit checks which will ruin our credit. (Already has) We still want the property and have invested a lot of time and effort in it, but feel it has been misrepresented by either the agent or seller. We are in the final stages now and only left with the exchange and completion.

Help!

agrinnall

Your options are go ahead as planned, renegotiate the price based on there being no parking, or pull out of the purchase. Your choice. What you aren't going to get is a parking space, so if that's a key factor then pulling out seems the obvious choice. There's little chance of you being able to make a successful case against the EA.

moneyistooshorttomention

What does the title plan indicate about whether this parking space is part of your property or no? Is the red boundary line drawn just around the garden or all around the garden and parking space beyond?

Do you have proof the fence was originally at the outside edge of the parking space and that the vendor then moved it inwards into the garden? - or is that just something the vendor said verbally?

NB; There is nothing you can do about the EA side of things - ie what they said on the particulars - even though you have proof of what they originally said.

davidmcn

What are the sellers now claiming? Are they selling you the "parking" space, but just not wanting to call it a parking space? Or is that land not included in the sale at all?

It's not clear from your post what sort of permission(s) you think they would have required - what does your solicitor say? Would it actually be a problem to get consent retrospectively? Has it been there for long enough that any objections would now be time-barred?

mrginge

T3RRY wrote: »

What are my options on this one? Who do we Chase after on this? We have already got the mortgage offer and going back to the bank if offered a discount will require further credit checks which will ruin our credit. (Already has) We still want the property and have invested a lot of time and effort in it, but feel it has been misrepresented by either the agent or seller. We are in the final stages now and only left with the exchange and completion.

Help!

Your only real option is reduce your offer. I'm not sure why you think doing so will have any impact on your credit or require further checks.

marksoton

T3RRY wrote: »

What are my options on this one? Who do we Chase after on this?

To achieve what exactly?

AdrianC

T3RRY wrote: »

We are in the process of buying a house and have not exchanged contracts yet.

Then there's no "mis-selling", because you haven't bought anything yet.

I then went onto the estate agents website and notice the agent have removed all references to the parking from the site. (Covering their act)

No, correcting an error as soon as it's been brought to their attention.

What are my options on this one?

You have three options :-
Buy the property in full knowledge of the actual parking situation, at the same price as previously agreed.
Buy the property in full knowledge of the actual parking situation, at a lower price than previously agreed.
Don't buy the property.

The second option is dependent on the seller's agreement.

Ithaca

It sounds like the system has worked in your favour. You conducted sensible pre-exchange enquiries, found a potential issue and have clarified it via the vendors' solicitor.

As noted, that gave you the option of walking away with no further impact on you or your finances, asking for a discount, or accepting it at the current price.

You've said you still want the property so it's clearly not a deal-breaker, so it sounds like the only issue is a perceived impact on your credit score if you ask your lender to reduce the mortgage amount. Assuming you have a mortgage agreed (at least in principle) why do you think asking for a lower amount based on a revised valuation would require further credit checks? And why would you think those checks would further damage your score?

Cakeguts

Lots of sales fall through before exchange. Some things do not come to light until the checks are done on boundaries and legal issues. Your situation is one of these.

The parking spaces do not appear to belong to the property you are buying. You are not going to get parking at the back. The property appears to end at the fence. Do you still want to buy the property now that you know that there is no parking at the back. Is the price still what you want to pay for a property without this parking? You will need to think about what you want to do and if you decide that you don't want to buy the property then pull out of the sale. Sales collapse.