"Seller" insists on us using the estate agents mortgage broker

davilown

ciderboy2009 said:

When an EA tried this on with me I asked them to confirm what they were saying to me in writing.

About an hour later I received a phone call informing me that the vendor had decided to drop this condition "as a favour to me".

Great plan! Really like this option, added with I’ll drop the offer round to the vendor directly

boxer234

Connells did this to me as well when I was a fresh FTB and didn’t know any better.  

mistrihelen

Connells did this to us and it backfired on both of us. They were so aggressive (about it being essential, about it making us an approved buyer etc) it put us off going as high as we wanted, and we lost the property. They went with someone else who eventually pulled out a couple of months later.

When it went back on the market they did ring us again but messed us around in another way.

I would never buy or sell with Connells.

NatNat77

The EA for our previous (ultimately, failed) purchase told us that our sellers wanted us to use the same conveyancer as them, and as they had good reviews and were competitively priced I was happy to. Back then I didn't really know what I was doing and took them at face value. They also tried to push us into using their in house mortgage broker as well but I pushed back on that as I knew they couldn't beat our existing mortgage, and went direct.

Later on, our sellers asked us who we were using for our conveyancing! So I wouldn't trust an ea as far as I could throw them. This was only a few months ago and I've learned so much since then, mainly due to these boards. Sometimes you have to play the game but you shouldn't be made to feel uncomfortable or pushed into something you don't want to do, the chances are, the sellers haven't got a clue and don't care! 

gab3x

I ended up using FA which was checking my affordability when buying my house but there was no pressure to do so.

What was important for me was that they were 'whole market' and had a single charge rather than take both fees from me and commission from my bank.

I did double check offers and was satisfied they gave best available rates. They made this whole process very easy and straightforward with plenty of opportunity to sense check things whenever I had questions.

Finally when transaction was completed they sent me a lovely personalised gift box so they thought about the whole customer journey.