Estate Agent giving landlord preferential treatment - what are our rights?

KateMcGill28

Hi all,

We’re in the process of a house sale which is dragging on and on and on. We think the person who is buying our house (who is a landlord) is having trouble getting the mortgage or deposit together. There has been no outstanding work or queries for weeks, and the solicitor has been waiting to go, but the buyer of our house isn’t willing to agree a exchange or completion date and their solicitor won’t tell us what the delay is.

When we were selling the house, we had a number of people interested in buying and it went to last and final offers. We are aware people who put in offers were asked to provide evidence of mortgage in principle etc to enable them to put in an offer.

The landlord bid the highest (which is now suspicious to us) is a well known landlord in the area and our estate agent seemed excited about doing business with her. When the outcome of the last and finals was put to us, she was sold to us by the estate agent as a cash buyer.

We should’ve exchanged before Christmas but we were told there was a delay because the landlord needed to change solicitors because she needed them to be on the mortgage lenders panel. This raised alarm bells as she was sold to us as a cash buyer.

Now there have been further delays as the landlord is not willing to give us an exchange or completion date, despite solicitors confirming there is no outstanding work or queries to be answered.

I’m getting suspicious that our estate agent took a gamble by giving her preferential treatment and not actually checking she had the means to buy our house (because they wanted her business) so I asked them if they checked and they said they took a phone call from her financial advisor.

We are aware that the other bidders were asked to provide written evidence they had the means to buy the property. It also makes us wonder if her ability to raise the funds should been checked before the offer was accepted?

Any advice would be greatly received - im really annoyed with the estate agent but think I might struggle to prove what we suspect them of doing? Do we have any rights to complain / withhold fees etc?

Thank you!!

diggingdude

Ask for a date to exchange or threaten to relist

HampshireH

As above. Do you even need to relist? You could go to you 2nd choice buyer and make contact if you decide to pull the sale

KateMcGill28

That’s an option we’ve discussed and we’re weighting up the pros and cons of waiting it out or starting the process again with another buyer.

Is there any recourse for the estate agent though? I really begrudge paying them their fee for putting us in this situation in the first place ?

Davesnave

KateMcGill28 wrote: »

Is there any recourse for the estate agent though? I really begrudge paying them their fee for putting us in this situation in the first place ?

Go for the option that puts you back in the driving seat. Give this woman an exchange deadline. If it's missed, go to the next best bidder / re-list.

You need to work with your agent just now, not antagonise them, so put grudges on one side and just show them you'll not be messed-with. 'Cash buyer' has several definitions and to some it just means someone who doesn't need to sell in order to buy.


If you want to pick a fight, do it after exchange when any resultant reduction in price received will be quantifiable.