Gazumping Drama

14sprocket

Hi, I wanted to share a story about a very frustrating experience of trying to buy a house. Some may remember me posting it a few months ago, but since then I actually uncovered a few additional details, which turned the story into a thriller, hence I wanted to ask for the community perspective on it.

In summary: I had an offer accepted on my "dream home", only to get gazumped shortly after. Here's the chronology of how the events unfolded:

Day 1: We're going to view the house, listed by our local branch of a very well-known global estate agency. The agency is represented by its head of the local office (call him Joe for the sake of the story). Both me and my wife instantly fall in love with the house, so after some consideration we give an offer at the guide price.

Day 3: Joe called to let us know that they received another offer at the same price. Having discussed with the vendor, they decide to move to the "closed envelope" auction procedure, so Joe asks us to place the best and final offer on the house.

Day 5: We're sending the best and final offer to Joe, moving quite a bit above the guide price.
Joe calls us in the afternoon to tell us that we won the auction (hooray!), subsequently confirms in writing that our offer is accepted, congrats etc.

Bubbly is uncorked, celebrations are in process.

Day 6: ***Something happens which we don't discover until months later, which makes us questions the integrity of the agent***

Day 8: We receive the sales memo, instruct the solicitor and mortgage broker

Day 12: We're getting a call from Joe's associate (let's call her Jill). Jill is very apologetic, but she explains that they got a new - higher - offer on the property, which they're obliged to pass on to the vendor. The owner decided to accept this new higher offer, so the house is no longer ours. When I ask if the new offer came from the party that lost the auction she says no, it's someone new, who wasn't in the picture before.

I demand to speak to Joe, and get hold of him late in the evening. He's sympathetic to our situation, but says the only way to solve for it is to increase our offer. He claims that the higher offer actually came from the auction losers, who didn't play by the rules. We discuss and decide to not increase our bid, i.e. moving on and saying good bye to the dream home...

So what happened on Day 6?

It was a few months later that I discovered that the agency made a post on the local Instagram group, which has few thousand subscribers (predominantly living in the area). The post effectively promoted "our house", including key photos and the message was "This is a great house etc etc. We already have several offers! You want to buy it - call Joe ASAP at the number XXXXXXXXX".
Again, this promotion was placed a day after our offer got accepted! Not only did they not stop marketing the house, but they put this proactive posting in the busy local Instagram group... I obviously have no way to prove it, but I suspect that this had something to do with us subsequently getting gazumped.

Now, the story doesn't stop here... Upon discovering the existence of this Instagram post, I decided to file a complaint with this global agency. I used the complaint form on their website to describe the story and express my frustration with how the offer process was handled. In three days time I received a response.... directly from Joe's mailbox. Again, this is a global estate agency with hundreds of branches, and the best way to deal with my complaint turned out to forward it to the subject of my concern to handle.

In his response Joe didn't address any of the issues I raised. He basically stated that he's not happy to see me complaining about him and that they'll provide a full response in due course. It's been two months already and I'm still waiting for this full response.

If you've made it thus far, I want to pick your brain on a couple of questions:

- Am I right to be upset about this situation and think that Joe/agency are in the wrong and have to own up to it? I have no personal vendetta against the guy or his agency, but I don't like being viewed as a "meat fodder" and getting dismissed so easily. 

- Should I decide to follow through on this, what's the best way to go about this? Do I have a legal claim against the agency? Is there any point in complaining to the agency HQ? Or should I just leave a review on Google/FB and move on?

Thanks!

davilown

What are you expecting from this?

The estate agent has to pass on any offers to the vendors - they can then decide whether to accept an offer.

Its the vendors decision, not the EA.

Nothing is binding until you exchange.

14sprocket

davilown said:

What are you expecting from this?

The estate agent has to pass on any offers to the vendors - they can then decide whether to accept an offer.

Its the vendors decision, not the EA.

Nothing is binding until you exchange.

Thanks for your response.

I believe that EA shouldn't solicit other offers on the property once has been accepted. However in my case EA started shouting from the rooftop the next day after my offer got accepted by the vendor.

Emmia

The agents were promoting the property to achieve the best price for the vendor, it wasn't "your house" as you hadn't exchanged. 

Just move on. 

Monsternextdoor

Out of curiosity was this property a repossession  ?

Tiddleshalifax

I agree with the answers. The post could have been a scheduled post and may not have been what resulted in the offer. 

In addition, unless you ask for it off market, they can continue to market it.

Flugelhorn

not unusual for an EA to continue marketing a place until there is proof of funds / ID etc etc 

14sprocket

Monsternextdoor said:

Out of curiosity was this property a repossession  ?

No, it wasn't

TDPIX

Sorry to hear this.

I'd be equally as annoyed as you, and also complain. I'd keep emailing the head office until someone other than Joe is appointed to investigate it.

An EA shouldn't be actively marketing a property after an offer is accepted... in a perfect world, that is. 

NameUnavailable

As above, the vendor decided to take the higher offer, not the EA.

What you haven't said, or maybe didn't think about - was the offer on condition that the house is taken off the market and no further viewings allowed? Some vendors will tell the EA to keep marketing a property up to exchange, in case the buyer drops out.

You can escalate your complaint but ultimately all you can hope for is a letter saying how sorry they feel for you but their client made the decision as to which offer they'd take.

The Instagram post may well have been lined up prior to your offer having been accepted (but in any case is a moot point if the vendor asked them to keep marketing).

14sprocket

Emmia said:

The agents were promoting the property to achieve the best price for the vendor, it wasn't "your house" as you hadn't exchanged. 

Just move on. 

I believe it's a very poor form for EA to run the "closed envelope" auction, accept the highest offer, and then make another push on promoting the property.
It's really not ok, and that what provokes gazumping