Pulling out of sale

SableCinder19

We are first time buyers and had an offer accepted on a house back in February. Within 2 weeks of acceptance we had a mortgage offer, solicitor and survey completed. The property is leasehold, and we were aware of this upon putting in an offer. In mid April my solicitor finally managed to get the information from the sellers solicitor about the lease. At this point we discovered that there was an escalating ground rent and our solicitor informed us that many mortgage offers can be further refused due to this. So we asked 2 questions: what is the price to purchase the freehold & what would it cost to cap the ground rent below £250p/a. We waited a month to get the answer from the sellers solicitor, to which we discovered we would need to pay £50 to find the freehold price (or some extreme fee to cap the ground rent). We bit the bullet and paid £50, expecting to hear back within 14 days. We are now over 28 days later and no word on the freehold price. This has gone on for too long and honestly the hassle has made us no longer want the house. It has been 4 months since offer acceptance and its just not worth the hassle anymore, yes we have had lock down but I know both solicitors and estate agents have been working remotely. If it is this much of a wait just to get something simple - a price, we dread to think what issues we might uncover while trying to purchase the freehold! This hasn't been an easy decision for us, we have spent near £1000 at this point. We have agreed to pull out with our solicitor and I phoned the estate agent also. The estate agent was actually quite rude and abrupt with me and said she is going to chase the freehold price for us and get back to me. Has anyone else experienced such frostiness from the estate agents? How do I stop them from trying to push me into a sale? I said no and gave a valid reason but they are still phoning and pushing! Do I just stop answering their calls? I don't want to be black listed and not be able to buy through them in the future! 

greatcrested

If you've written formally to both your solicitor and the estate agent advising them you have withdrawn your offer, and instructing your solicitor to undertake no further work other than to prepare a final invoice for you for the work they've done so far, you can ignore any other calls etc.

Chandler85

Well the estate agent won't get commission now, so of course they will try to persuade you.

They shouldn't be frosty, but they don't work for you and they might have had no idea that you were having issues, so were a little blindsided that you suddenly pulled out, no real excuse though.

The question is, despite it taking so long, if the only issue is the ground rent.  Then it seems like an odd choice to pull out "due to hassle" without knowing the answer.  Your next house might have another issue that drags out instead, vendors that drag their feet, anything.

If the ground rent came back and nothing could be changed, or your survey came back as the house needed loads of work then people see that a big issue.  4 months (especially including lockdown) is nothing.

Pulling out is totally your right though.

ChloeManoey

Yepp if you've made your decision, and nothing they say can change it, then you needn't have any more contact with them really. I understand your concerns about being "black listed" but I'm not sure that would happen, they are all about getting the sales! 

I'm also going through the same issue, trying to obtain a deed of variation to cap the ground rent at £250. The freeholder has said they have a standard one they use for this issue, as it comes up regularly, fingers crossed! But I understand your pain with this one  

ThePants999

They're just doing their job - trying to sell the house for their client.

Only you can decide where the right balance lies between protecting your time and energy versus keeping this estate agent on-side for a future purchase. You're absolutely right that if you push hard, you run the risk of this agent saying to another client in future, "I have an offer for you, but I don't recommend you accept it - this buyer pulled out of a previous transaction for what I think was a nonsense reason, and blocked me when I tried to talk to them about it". If you're really keen to avoid that, you've got to convince this estate agent that you're a thoroughly reasonable person who's pulling out for a good reason.

FWIW, I don't think it's a particularly good reason to pull out. Yes, there's faff and delay dealing with this kind of stuff, but it shouldn't significantly affect your enjoyment of the property. How long is the lease, and what actually are the terms of escalation?

SableCinder19

Chandler85 said:

Well the estate agent won't get commission now, so of course they will try to persuade you.

They shouldn't be frosty, but they don't work for you and they might have had no idea that you were having issues, so were a little blindsided that you suddenly pulled out, no real excuse though.

The question is, despite it taking so long, if the only issue is the ground rent.  Then it seems like an odd choice to pull out "due to hassle" without knowing the answer.  Your next house might have another issue that drags out instead, vendors that drag their feet, anything.

If the ground rent came back and nothing could be changed, or your survey came back as the house needed loads of work then people see that a big issue.  4 months (especially including lockdown) is nothing.

Pulling out is totally your right though.

Sorry hassle maybe isn't the correct term. We just feel like at every stage we have been the ones chasing answers and paying fees and its has whole heatedly put us off the house. We paid the £50 as we wanted to know the price and were told it would take 14 days, its now double that and we haven't heard a peep. We agreed prior to paying the £50 that we would give them a month to come back with the price and decide, its been a month and no word from them. Its been a tough decision but we need to go with what feels right for us. 

SableCinder19

ThePants999 said:

They're just doing their job - trying to sell the house for their client.

Only you can decide where the right balance lies between protecting your time and energy versus keeping this estate agent on-side for a future purchase. You're absolutely right that if you push hard, you run the risk of this agent saying to another client in future, "I have an offer for you, but I don't recommend you accept it - this buyer pulled out of a previous transaction for what I think was a nonsense reason, and blocked me when I tried to talk to them about it". If you're really keen to avoid that, you've got to convince this estate agent that you're a thoroughly reasonable person who's pulling out for a good reason.

FWIW, I don't think it's a particularly good reason to pull out. Yes, there's faff and delay dealing with this kind of stuff, but it shouldn't significantly affect your enjoyment of the property. How long is the lease, and what actually are the terms of escalation?

Thanks for your response. It is a ground rent with no cap that can increase every year at whatever rate they so please. We considered pulling out when we discovered the issue, we even discussed it with the estate agents at the time. But we stuck with it to discover the price, which we paid for, and still have no clearer answer. 

princeofpounds

They can't push you into a sale. The EA is just upset they lost commission. They may well treat you as a flakey buyer in future but there's no helping that - all it means is that any future vendor you negotiate with through them will hear of this experience. The EA will probably cool down a bit in time.

However, what you asked for is not just 'a simple price'. Somewhere out there is a freeholder (who is that, do you know?). They are the ones who can give a price. Your vendor, the leaseholder, can't easily force them to hurry, so it's highly likely the delay is down to a third party (as is common in property transactions). I actually don't think your action is unreasonable (just), but your 14 day deadline was never realistic; freeholders rarely move that quickly.

You'll probably find now that they come back with a price. From their point of view, they may wonder if this is just a negotiating tactic to hurry things along, so they'll give it a go.

Just FYI, when talking about changing ground rent clauses, there are two methods. One is negotiating with the freeholder. The other is pursuing a statutory lease extension, where an official process is used to calculate a 'fair' price. So the property can be 'fixed', it's just a question of how long it takes, who does it, and how much it costs.

If the vendors had good knowledge, they would have fixed this before marketing, as it's true that mortgage lenders are trying to stamp out certain kinds of escalation clauses (even when they wouldn't cause problems for centuries in reality).

macman

How can they blacklist you as a buyer? In such a case they are acting for the vendor, not for you, and if you make an offer then they are legally bound to convey it to the vendor.
You don't need the EA to be your best friend, and they don't want to be yours: they simply want to sell properties and collect their commission. If they are hassling you too much, then tell them not to call again.
It sounds like your real gripe is with the vendor and their solicitor.

GixerKate

If you have spent close to £1,000 do you really want to walk away and start again with another property?  If you don't want the property anymore fair enough but delays should be expected, plus we have had lockdown in the middle so everything literally stopped.  Buying a property can and usually does take months especially when waiting for a bit of documentation which might require your solicitor asking the other solicitor who needs to ask someone else to ask someone for some information.  If just one of the links was furloughed (for instance) then you won't be getting that documentation for a long while.

Have you checked that your mortgage offer would actually be impacted?  The solicitor has advised that it 'can impact mortgage offers' but has it actually impacted your mortgage offer?  

Although you can't be black listed by an EA they can choose who can and cannot view properties.  Our EA is now being very strict on who can view our property and is ruling people out before they come anywhere near us.

davidmcn

SableCinder19 said:

ThePants999 said:

They're just doing their job - trying to sell the house for their client.

Only you can decide where the right balance lies between protecting your time and energy versus keeping this estate agent on-side for a future purchase. You're absolutely right that if you push hard, you run the risk of this agent saying to another client in future, "I have an offer for you, but I don't recommend you accept it - this buyer pulled out of a previous transaction for what I think was a nonsense reason, and blocked me when I tried to talk to them about it". If you're really keen to avoid that, you've got to convince this estate agent that you're a thoroughly reasonable person who's pulling out for a good reason.

FWIW, I don't think it's a particularly good reason to pull out. Yes, there's faff and delay dealing with this kind of stuff, but it shouldn't significantly affect your enjoyment of the property. How long is the lease, and what actually are the terms of escalation?

It is a ground rent with no cap that can increase every year at whatever rate they so please.

That really doesn't sound likely. Are you sure you've got it right?