Purple Bricks

JockLincs

Good afternoon
We are trying to sell our house through purple bricks. Basically we found a buyer who made us an offer which we accepted but they then pulled out a couple of weeks later. They informed their solicitors and purple bricks and were told by purple bricks ok we will inform the sellers. 3 weeks later and we had had the draft copy of the contract we hadn't heard anything. We knew the couple who wanted to buy wanted a quick sale so my wife eventually got hold of them and it was them who told us that they had to pull out. To say we were stunned was an understatement. We had payed out for for the garden to be done at our new house( I know hindsight is a great thing) we were looking forward to going on holiday but to be told this felt like well im sure you know. My wife got hold of purple bricks who admitted they were told but forgot to tell us. If we had known we would have delayed the work on the garden etc. It has caused us stress anger felt let down also missed out on 3 weeks trying to sell the house because purple bricks hadn't notified us and get it back on the market. Apart from a pathetic apology have we got an recourse we can take.
Many thanks for your time

rococomaiden

38.8% of sales fall through; don't count on a buyer until the exchange stage.

Additionally maybe PurpleBricks offers fall through even more often? I don't think they make the buyer provide them with proof of funds/mortgage in principal etc.

I don't think there is anything you can do, but personally I would try to get a refund and list with a standard estate agent instead.

eddddy

So it sounds like your key complaint is that you suffered a loss because PB failed to pass on the message that your buyer had pulled-out for 3 weeks.

• It doesn't sound like PB breached the contract - so there's no scope for claiming damages for that.

• ... unless you want to argue that they didn't carry out there service with "reasonable care and skill" - as that would be a breach of an implied contract term.

• However, PB are members of The Property Ombudsman scheme, who have a mandatory code of practice, which includes:

12a After acceptance of the offer by the seller, and until exchange of contracts you have no direct influence on such matters as the conveyancing process or the mortgage lending process. Your obligations to the client are:

• to monitor progress;

• to assist where possible, as asked;

• to report information deemed helpful to bringing the
transaction to fruition;

• where there is a chain, routinely check the immediate transactions and communicate information helpful to bringing your client’s transaction to fruition.

You must keep written or electronic records of such activity.

Link: https://www.tpos.co.uk/images/codes-of-practice/TPOE27-8_Code_of_Practice_for_Residential_Estate_Agents_A4_FINAL.pdf

If an EA fails to follow the code, and a seller suffers a loss as a result, the EA can tell the EA to pay compensation, so you could consider that route.

(But I'm not sure that you would necessarily have a very strong case.)

See: https://www.tpos.co.uk/consumers/how-to-make-a-complaint