First Time seller - what to expect

a155sjd

We tried to sell our house in 2012 but had a nightmare with estate agents making up non-existent viewings, losing house keys and just walking in without prior notice we decided not to sell at that time. As a consequence I'm not sure I trust EAs.

We now want to sell and were going to do an open house (and get some minor work done in the bathroom) as the house is now empty (we moved to another area) but the agents told us they had a couple of people who were interested without us doing any work.

As we want a quick sale we priced it lower than their estimate we had an offer on Thursday of 10,000 less but had some people in on Saturday. Yesterday we had an offer of asking and we were told the buyer was in a good position (FTB and they had assessed their affordability), today the written confirmation came though and it says they weren't able to confirm their affordibility.

Should I be concerned at this?

Secondly the EA have our solicitor details, should we get the buyers Solicitor details? EA said yesterday they would send them over to us but instead have only sent over the email with offer details.

My solicitor hasnt heard anything from the EA yet. Obviously as its empty we'll be liable for council tax and other bills on that property so would like to minimise this by pushing the sale through as fast as possible (I know searches take a while but where I can speed things up I'd like to)

Slinky

You haven't said whether you've actually accepted the offer? Your solicitor won't have heard anything if you haven't.

a155sjd

yes we accepted the offer and have had email confirmation from the EA today which stated the position of the buyer was different than what was mentioned on the phone yesterday.

AlexMac

The EA will issue a "memorandum of sale" with agreed price, vendor and buyer details and both side's solicitors contact info. They will copy that to you and your and the buyer's solicitors as a trigger for the lawyers to start acting (assuming you have formally instructed your solicitor and the buyer has done likewise, advised the EA, and paid a deposit to their solicitor who usually won't start searches without a bit of money up front from the buyer.)

At least that's what every EA has done in my last half dozen transactions.

So get on the EA's case. Mine typically issue the memorandum of sale by email the day the offer is accepted. The Ea's job is to hassle the buyer; especially as they don't get paid til completion!

If nothing happend in a few days, threaten to put it back on the market.

a155sjd

Thanks pinged a reply back to the EA and the office manager has come back to me.

The holdup is cos the buyer chose a solicitor who isnt on the halifax panel so should have one who is tomorrow.

Mini panic over, just wish they had come back to me when I called earlier ....

G_M

Good grief! If you panic that quickly over such minor matters, you are looking at a stroke and/or heart attack long before you get anywhere near Exchanging Contracts!

Chill!