Vendor impersonated me.... help!

baldelectrician

Run
Follow your instinct

AnotherJoe

eddddy wrote: »

(FWIW, for this to be 'fraud by misrepresentation', the seller would have to be doing this to make a financial gain. It doesn't sound like there's a financial gain involved.)

The financial gain would be her selling her house by "signing off" on a situation with the conveyancer as if she were the OP, when the OP wouldn't. For example there might be a missing document and the OP might want it before exchanging and she might instruct the conveyancer to exchange without that document. .

Albala

rajeshk4u wrote: »

If I am right, it seems the seller has phoned your conveyancer, to get an update on the progress of this purchase.

Sometimes one solicitor is waiting on another solicitor for a piece of paper. I think she is trying to unblock any delays. So if your conveyancer had said the vendor's solicitor have not sent us "xyz", then she would have gone back to her solicitor and asked him, why he has n't sent "xyz". Solicitors can play a paper ping pong match and it can delays things...

The vendor is trying to help the sale along, but their method is naughty, unethical and foolish.

That's a very rosy-tinted view of what is potentially illegal conduct. If she has said things like 'shouldn't that be enough for us' or 'that's not a problem' she is trying to interfere in the process, not just find out what's going on. Suppose the conveyancer acted on those words, and then something went pear shaped as a result? The buyer would come back to the conveyancer and the conveyancer would say 'you told me it was fine', and what would a court say with one person's word against the other?

If she wants to push things along, she is entitled to nag her own solicitor or house agent as much as she likes. Legally, she could even contact the buyer's conveyancer in her own name and ask questions (though she ought to get the bum's rush for that) but she is not entitled to impersonate another person to their legal adviser for her own ends, which is what she is doing. This is a very serious matter.

Albala

eddddy wrote: »

(FWIW, for this to be 'fraud by misrepresentation', the seller would have to be doing this to make a financial gain. It doesn't sound like there's a financial gain involved.)

There is a potential loss, in that having information you are not supposed to have could give you a financial advantage in a negotiation, and as another poster pointed out, it could mean a loss to the OP if the conveyancer was told to cut a corner. There may also be a data protection aspect to it as well- impersonating someone to their legal adviser to get private information about them doesn't sound hunky-dory in data protection terms to me.

Cosmocraving

Before listening to the recordings I assumed that she was probably frustrated with the situation and trying to find out more.

However, listening to the recordings it is more deceitful than that for example... they (the sellers) have agreed to put in place a chancel policy and my conveyancer on the phone to her states that we need to see a copy of this which is when she says ‘can this not be dealt with on completion do we really need to see evidence’. Which makes me think they weren’t going to do it.

Another example is the roads are not adopted as it is a relatively new estate and my conveyancer states we need section xxx and she says ‘well I’m not worried about that my sister lives nearby so I know its not a problem’.

There are numerous examples like that where she is clearly trying to steer them away from doing anything more. She keeps telling them that we have agreed to exchange this week and keeps referring to things being hurried along.

Last night I emailed the estate agent asking to speak to them as I am now concerned that she may have gone to my mortgage company pretending to be me. I had a issue earlier in the process where the estate agent kept chasing me for a copy of the mortgage company’s survey as the sellers had brought through help to buy. I repeatedly stated I did not have it and they said well we are going to ring your mortgage company then! To which I stated that I did not give permission for this and stated that when I received it I would be able to tell them if it met the criteria of a survey they wanted. It then went really quiet and I assumed that the seller had obtained their own survey but now, as you can imagine I’m not sure.

AnotherJoe

To reiterate my initial advice.
Police. This is beyond the pale.
Pull out.

Flugelhorn

eddddy wrote: »

(FWIW, for this to be 'fraud by misrepresentation', the seller would have to be doing this to make a financial gain. It doesn't sound like there's a financial gain involved.)

I think my concern would be that the vendor is trying to get the purchase to go through without some crucial bit of evidence that may in the long term cause the purchaser to lose money - what if the road never gets adopted ? etc etc

Personally if I were OP I would go very, very quiet, mysterious and unobtainable for a few days - if necessary state that "I am considering options and investigating fraud".. then when you have them worried enough, reduce the offer. (or follow Another Joe's advice above)

m0bov

You need to contact fraud line, also get this escalated at your sol. Unless this is a wind up i cant believe you still want to complete.

Clutterfree

You say she is denying it but is she aware of the voice recordings?

Also, I thought the Chancel insurance was usually bought by the buyer of the property rather than the vendor?
I know when we bought our current home we purchased it through our solicitor.

Doodles

I also feel you should contact the Police, and pull out. NOW!