offer accepted-should house still be open to sale

mrs_baggins

if a house price has been accepted by the seller is the house effectively still on the market? My friend put an offer in for a house 2k under the asking price. It was accepted and 2 weeks down the line it is still being advertsied. Is this correct. She is due to have a surveyor in this week but now doesnt know what to do. If the seller wants the full asking price why didnt they say? I know nothing is certian until all parties have agreed but this start doesnt give much confidence from the seller if he is still letting people view

Running_Horse

Does your friend have a buyer? If so, I would threaten to withdraw.

A_Nice_Englishman

Is your friend's house sold? Has she got a mortgage agreed in principle. Does the estate agent know this and that she has a survey arranged?

From the seller's and estate agent's point of view, not having the above in place doesn't give much confidence that the buyer is willing and able to proceed. Mortgages should be agreed in principle before making an offer and surveys are normally done within a week or so of an offer being accepted.

Sammy85_2

Alot of estate agents wont put a sold sign up until they have concrete proof that the buyer is in a position to go. If nothing happens following the acceptance of the offer, they may have lost days or weeks of potential enquires because of the sold sign.

When i helped my sister purchase her first house, we agreed to pay full asking price provided it was removed from the window and sold signs put up.(as it was way cheaper than anything in the area and competition from other ftb/investors was hot)

You could always pop in and ask them to put a sold sstc in the window, just for your peace of mind. Worth a try.

A_Nice_Englishman

I should have mentioned that it's the seller who decides whether to stop marketing the property after accepting, not the estate agent. At least it should be.

cheekeemonkey

I think that the EA/Seller are (i) hedging their bets and continuing to market for greeds sake or (ii) are/were unclear that your friend's offer is firm and backed up by an ability to proceed.

I think a quick call to the EA to explain and gain clarity is what's required.

For what it's worth, we have accepted an offer on our property but since the potential buyer has not yet sold their property we have *agreed* that we will continue to market the property and take viewings - they understand this and are happy about our position.

Additionally, if we receive an offer that is able to proceed more quickly then we will inform them and then make a decision that is right for us.

CM

PasturesNew

I continued to have my house marketed after I accepted an offer.
Not to get more money. I said that I wouldn't be accepting higher offers.
But to not miss out on further potential buyers in case the sale fell through.

There is too much at stake for a seller to just whip the house off the market because you say you want to buy it.

shelly

From our personal experience recently......When we had our offer accepted we said it was on the condition the house was removed from the market immediately. It was such a bargain we didn't want anyone else to view it The vendor was happy to do so.
When we sold our house we removed it from the market immediately after accepting a full asking price offer from the first viewers through the door. The following day we had a viewer come back and offer 3K over the offer we had accepted. We refused because we have morals.

SquatNow

If the vendor still wants to market the property then that gives you a good estimation of their attitude. Imagine all the ways as a vendor you could screw the buyer over. Now walk away.

Maybe offer them a £200 deposit to take it off the market.... if they refuse, ring them up, laugh in their face then slam the phone down.

Plenty more houses out there, and sale prices are dropping.

mrs_baggins

my friend is a first time buyer, mortgage is agreed and no chain. they agreed to take the house off the market upon accepting the offer but its not being done so I think a call to the state agent will be done first thing so a decision can be made n he surveyor.

cattie

Many estate agents like to wait until survey is back & buyer is happy to proceed with purchase before removing property from market altogether.

In lots of cases even though the property still appears to be on the market, any interested parties will be told it's under offer, subject to survey & invited to leave their details should the purchase not go ahead.