Bullying tactics from Estate Agents

leanne_flan

Pepod said:

So it's not a secret that EA's have been known to occasionally employ some shady tactics, but try not to get too sucked in to thinking everything is 'against' you. I had a similar situation as a vendor - I had an offer from a nice couple for 5k under asking price which I declined because I wanted no less than asking and had good interest. I then got an offer for asking price from a different couple who were a bit more tied up in a chain, so I asked the EA to let the first couple know if they could do asking price then I would accept that from them, but if not then to accept the asking price offer from the second couple. The first couple tried to meet half way so the second couples asking price offer was accepted on the spot. Now in my case, that was the end of it, but if the first couple had have come back even 5 minutes later saying they would offer more, I wouldn't have accepted out of principle of already agreeing with the other couple.

If you see it from the vendors point of view as I saw it above, would you not agree that was very fair? Could you also not see how an EA might have made a remark about negotiating since they knew what the result was going to be?

All I can say is hard luck, you made the wrong choice this time but it could have been the right thing to do in a different scenario.

Naturally the caveat to all this is that EA's do sometimes employ shady tactics!

Interesting read, thanks for the comment. If the EA said "it's yours for £5k more otherwise they'll go with the other buyer"...would've made a whole lotta difference. We also got proof of AIP and proof of deposit funds to him as soon as he asked whereas we were told they were waiting for this from the other buyer still the next day.
I'm taking it as definitely a learning experience! 

AdrianC

leanne_flan said:

AdrianC said:

leanne_flan said:

When he first told us, he actually said "the house is guaranteed to be yours" for £5k more. 

IF you'd said "Yep, OK. +£5k.".
Which you didn't.

You said "Ooh, no. Maybe £2.5k?"
Then you wandered off to have a think.

If he was trying to "bully" you into offering more, why are you now continuing to search?

Thanks for the comment. We actually said £3.5k and then agreed to the £5k... literally within minutes.

Whatevs.
You were asked for £5k.
You said no, and started worrying about £1,500.
The other buyer said yes.

He also had a copy of proof of our deposit funds and AIP as we sent this as soon as it was asked, so knows we were serious.

Bare minimum for a serious offer.

We're continuing to search as we want a property...

No, you're continuing to search because somebody else is buying this one, because they met the seller's expectations first.

Surrey_EA

leanne_flan said:

I'm taking it as definitely a learning experience! 

Which in large part is don't mess about over £1500 on a house you really want to buy.