Horrible situation with estate agent - advice needed

stormCat99

Hi,

Before I start, I should say that I think we are in a no-win situation, but thought I would ask if anyone has any useful advice.

Our house is on the market, originally it was with House Network, who are online only. After a few months, a new agent opened in our village who were offering a £500 fee deal. The advantage of using them was that they get us into local newspapers - as well as having a shop. They agreed to go dual agency with House Network - so far so good.

About 2 months later, the agent in our village was bought out, by another agency. We were told our contract would be honoured etc, so all seemed fine.

Shortly after I had to call this new agency, with a few queries - e.g. they had asked if we wanted their new board putting up outside, we had agreed but they hadn't yet delivered it so I was calling to check on it.

The upshot was, that I had an awful conversation with the manager of the agency, I am not exaggerating to say she is one of the nastiest people I have come across. It quickly became apparent that she wanted to get out of the dual agency £500 fee contract, as it is less profitable for her than other contracts she has. She was yelling down the phone at me - I managed not to yell back but was very upset and shaken. She said several times that the best thing would be if we took the house off the market with them.

I disagreed. I realised what she was trying to do by being obstructive and nasty - clearly she wanted to get rid of us as less profitable customers, but is tied into a contract with us. So all she can do is try to get us to cancel the contract instead.

Anyhow, I somehow managed to end this nightmare conversation by coming to an agreement with her to disagree on some points, and left it at that.

Since then, we have noticed our property is no longer in the shop window; we've checked several times over the last month, and not once has it been rotated around and put into the window. My husband called today (I couldn't bear to talk to them again) to ask about this.

Believe me, my husband is very docile, very patient and would never fall out with anyone. However he spoke to the manager, and she was exactly the same with him. Aggressive and nasty, and trying her best to get out of the contract.

Basicallly, we are extremely loathe to cancel this contract, as we really really want the advantage of having our property in the local papers. No other agencies in our area offer the reduced fee deal, so if we did cancel with this awful agent, we would either have to stay with House Network only and not be in the local papers, or go on an expensive contract with someone.

Legally, I believe we can keep our contract with this agent - is that likely to be correct? However at the moment, I can't bear to talk to them, and my poor husband isn't overly keen either. So it is hardly a healthy situation, and obviously I'm worried that even if we did sell, then it would be difficult to deal with the agent and ensure everything went smoothly.

Sorry for the long post - has anyone been in a similar situation, or does anyone have any advice? Many thanks.

Debt_Free_Chick

boots_babe wrote: »

Legally, I believe we can keep our contract with this agent - is that likely to be correct? However at the moment, I can't bear to talk to them, and my poor husband isn't overly keen either. So it is hardly a healthy situation, and obviously I'm worried that even if we did sell, then it would be difficult to deal with the agent and ensure everything went smoothly.

Yes you can stick to your side of the contract and expect the EA to stick to theirs. However, what exactly have they agreed to do i.e. what does the contract say they will do?

Have they agreed to advertise in the window? For how long? Have they already fulfilled this e.g. at the beginning of the contract?

Ditto the newspapers - for how long did they agree to include your property in their listings? Did they actually fulfil this at the beginning of the contract?

You need to pour over the contract and be sure about what they committed to and if they've fulfilled that commitment or not. If they haven't, then a polite letter pointing out what the contract requires them to do would be the first port of call.

If they have fulfilled the contract, then walk away as you can't force them to do any more. Anyway, there's nothing worse than an EA with no incentive and no willingness to do their best to sell your property. Even if another agent charged £1,500 that could be money well spent if they found you a buyer

teabelly

Ring her up and record her behaving in such an unprofessional manner. Stick it on youtube and as many property related discussion sites as you can :-) She'll be toast within weeks. There is no excuse for behaving with a client in this manner. If the EA is a member of a professional body then report them to that. If you don't do anything else then reporting them to a professional association they're a member of might do some good.

Doozergirl

How long have you been on the market?

There is a lot of talk of 'months' here. I can see why perhaps, if your property is not selling, that the agent is tired of spending time and money on it. Of course, the manager's behaviuor is appaling but I cannot see how you can possibly benefit from being with these people now. They will have zero interest in pushing your property - probably regardless of whether you were on a £500 fee deal or not. Agents just forget about you if no-one wants what you have to sell.

I would try price drop if you have been on as long as it sounds. What has your feedback been? Gives you more likelyhood of selling with House Network and may just renew the interest of the EA.

If you want to post us up a link, we can try to help? Or did you do that already? Is it the new build?

stormCat99

Debt_free_check - thanks for the reply. I'm at work at the moment, but when I get home I'm intending to get the contract out and read it through. Your last paragraph is what I am afraid of - and why I think it could be a no-win situation.

Even if we are entitled to be advertised as we think, then it may well not help us even if we push it. A reluctant estage agent won't be much help

stormCat99

teabelly wrote: »

Ring her up and record her behaving in such an unprofessional manner. Stick it on youtube and as many property related discussion sites as you can :-) She'll be toast within weeks. There is no excuse for behaving with a client in this manner. If the EA is a member of a professional body then report them to that. If you don't do anything else then reporting them to a professional association they're a member of might do some good.

Your post made me laugh and cheered me up a bit - I would love nothing more than to take up your YouTube suggestion, after all they deserve it in my eyes. However I wouldn't feel right doing that to someone, I just couldn't.....I never thought about a professional body. Isn't it the NAEA or something? Once I've checked over the contract tonight, I will look into that. Thanks for that suggestion.

stormCat99

Doozergirl wrote: »

How long have you been on the market?

There is a lot of talk of 'months' here. I can see why perhaps, if your property is not selling, that the agent is tired of spending time and money on it. Of course, the manager's behaviuor is appaling but I cannot see how you can possibly benefit from being with these people now. They will have zero interest in pushing your property - probably regardless of whether you were on a £500 fee deal or not. Agents just forget about you if no-one wants what you have to sell.

I would try price drop if you have been on as long as it sounds. What has your feedback been? Gives you more likelyhood of selling with House Network and may just renew the interest of the EA.

If you want to post us up a link, we can try to help? Or did you do that already? Is it the new build?

Well we first went on the market in February. Went dual agent with the local agency around May - I think. Then they were only taken over in mid-July, so this new agent surely hasn't had time to get 'fed up' of marketing us, especially as they don't seem to have done any marketing as yet

Yes I posted our link around May when we were going dual agent - just before or after I think, I can't remember. The feedback in general was positive, and the consensus was that it was a fair price.

We've dropped the price twice already, and have asked advice from other estate agents (on the suggestion that we might be moving agent), and they have advised against another price drop. Apparently we are already at a good price, and dropping it further won't necessarily help as the market is just so slow at the moment. The market certainly is slow, as we've seen hardly any new properties going up recently, with interest rates going up, sub-prime market fears, etc etc, I can understand why.

We would be willing to drop again if we thought it would help - and definitely don't rule out doing that in the future. But at the moment I think we agree that it probably won't help. Feedback from viewings has always been positive - we've had no negative comments other than the fact that they would prefer more parking room. We are aware of this issue - it is one reason we would like to move! We have a single garage, and room for 2 cars on the drive, but ours is a modern estate, with a narrowish road, and it is not ideal.

Thanks for posting your advice and help :-)

Debt_Free_Chick

boots_babe wrote: »

Yes I posted our link around May when we were going dual agent - just before or after I think, I can't remember.

Previous thread including a link to Rightmove here

stormCat99

Debt_Free_Chick wrote: »

Previous thread including a link to Rightmove here

Thanks for digging out it! I should point out that the estate agent that I am referring to in this thread, is my ORIGINAL local estate agent, rather than the one that took over a couple of months ago.