Seller increases asking price after 10 months when they have caused the delay in exchange!

GDB2222

lookstraightahead said:

JReacher1 said:

lookstraightahead said:

JReacher1 said:

It’s annoying but house prices have risen in the last ten months by around 10% so something that was valued at £464k in April 2021 is probably worth closely to £500k now. So I can sort of see why they want more money. 

Look at it this way, if the housing market had crashes in the last 10 months I assume you would want to renegotiate now and offer less. I think you need to treat this purely as a financial business transaction and take the emotion out of it. 

I would be tempted to get HSBC to value it again and see if they now think it’s worth more than £464k

Don't agree with this I think it would be valued at less if anything.

And I wouldn't buy from them either , because they're likely to wait another ten months.

so from a financial transaction perspective, they're a waste of time money and effort. From a moral perspective, they're not someone I would now choose to buy from (just wouldn't rest easy with me).

Why would this house be the one house that loses value in the last 10 months? That goes against what is seen in the current housing market. 

Not seen by me. Not seen by lots of people in fact. We don't have the last ten months up to date data as it's always behind. 

Can you imagine every vendor doing this - making people wait ten months to increase the price. Anyway, op seems very level headed.

Nobody made the OP wait. He chose to buy from someone who was not yet in a position to proceed. 

When people make offers, the agents vet them and make sure that they are in a position to proceed. Buyers need to do the same thing with their sellers, or suffer the consequences. 

Flugelhorn

I think price wise and mad market wise there was some excessive offering going on where there was lots of competition - seemed to be family 3-5 bed houses, neighbours sold and people were queuing to get a viewing, perhaps same with smaller houses - flats were going less quickly and some were bought under offering price 

rexmedorum

JReacher1 said:

I still think you are putting emotion into your decision and taking it personally.  Get the house revalued by HSBC and see what price they now attach to the property.

If they come back and say it is now worth £500k then that will help you make a decision.

Its been 10 months.  Prices have changed :-)

I strongly dosagree: I certainly wouldn't be spending any more money on the deal at this stage as it sounds at least 90% likley to be wasted.

BV88

GDB2222 said:

lookstraightahead said:

JReacher1 said:

lookstraightahead said:

JReacher1 said:

It’s annoying but house prices have risen in the last ten months by around 10% so something that was valued at £464k in April 2021 is probably worth closely to £500k now. So I can sort of see why they want more money. 

Look at it this way, if the housing market had crashes in the last 10 months I assume you would want to renegotiate now and offer less. I think you need to treat this purely as a financial business transaction and take the emotion out of it. 

I would be tempted to get HSBC to value it again and see if they now think it’s worth more than £464k

Don't agree with this I think it would be valued at less if anything.

And I wouldn't buy from them either , because they're likely to wait another ten months.

so from a financial transaction perspective, they're a waste of time money and effort. From a moral perspective, they're not someone I would now choose to buy from (just wouldn't rest easy with me).

Why would this house be the one house that loses value in the last 10 months? That goes against what is seen in the current housing market. 

Not seen by me. Not seen by lots of people in fact. We don't have the last ten months up to date data as it's always behind. 

Can you imagine every vendor doing this - making people wait ten months to increase the price. Anyway, op seems very level headed.

Nobody made the OP wait. He chose to buy from someone who was not yet in a position to proceed. 

When people make offers, the agents vet them and make sure that they are in a position to proceed. Buyers need to do the same thing with their sellers, or suffer the consequences. 

How, dare I ask, do you propose to vet sellers ability to proceed? Should I ask to
interview them, perhaps get their consent for a lie detector test? Vendors can say whatever they like about how motivated they are to sell, they can say they will go to rented, live with family etc. there is no way to verify that and no obligation for them to do so.

In fact the only reliable method of assessing motivation to sell with such little access to information is do they have a pulse or not! Maybe I should specify that with the EA in my new search. It’s easy with hindsight but how an earth was I know they would

mess me about for 10 months? It would be a very small pool of potential properties available to me if I limited my search to only those without an onward purchase.  

Granted after the first time they pulled out of their purchase that was the signal to act on. If we had been in the U.K. and able to view properties we would have moved on. We stayed with it because we were the other side of the Atlantic and not thrilled about making offers on properties we had not seen in person. Unlike our vendors we don’t want to waste peoples time.

Most comments on this thread have had differing opinions but on the whole very helpful and surprisingly insightful to the situation (or funny!), until now… remind me never to go for a drink with you, I couldn’t suffer the consequences… 

Flugelhorn

@BV88 definitely impossible to vet people - they will say anything and anything can happen in a chain, reckon you would  have been on the lookout for others if you had been in the UK but it is very hard from USA, suspect also that the fact that you weren't around and maybe without specific date of coming back made the vendors (and family) think there was no hurry?? Who knows, house buying and selling does strange things to people

JReacher1

If you ignore the assumptions made by lots of posters on here then what has happened in reality appears to be:-

1) The OP's offer was accepted on the house 10 months
2) The sellers have offered and accepted on three house in the last 10 months
3) All three houses have had survey issues raised before exchange which has led to the sellers reducing their offer
4) The sales have fallen through on all three houses due to the seller of these houses rejecting the offers.
5) Market conditions mean the sellers now think the house is worth more than it was 10 months ago so have now rejected the original offer.

I don't think saying the sellers are time wasters is fair. 

They are very likely finding out that when they look for houses now the prices have gone up so they themselves need to increase the price of their own house.

rexmedorum

JReacher1 said:

If you ignore the assumptions made by lots of posters on here then what has happened in reality appears to be:-

1) The OP's offer was accepted on the house 10 months
2) The sellers have offered and accepted on three house in the last 10 months
3) All three houses have had survey issues raised before exchange which has led to the sellers reducing their offer
4) The sales have fallen through on all three houses due to the seller of these houses rejecting the offers.
5) Market conditions mean the sellers now think the house is worth more than it was 10 months ago so have now rejected the original offer.

I don't think saying the sellers are time wasters is fair. 

They are very likely finding out that when they look for houses now the prices have gone up so they themselves need to increase the price of their own house.

it depends how minor the minor issues they were trying to get money off for really are, but surely if it's happened 3 times hey're either really unlucky, have unrealistic expectations or are looking for an excuse not to have to move.

JReacher1

rexmedorum said:

JReacher1 said:

If you ignore the assumptions made by lots of posters on here then what has happened in reality appears to be:-

1) The OP's offer was accepted on the house 10 months
2) The sellers have offered and accepted on three house in the last 10 months
3) All three houses have had survey issues raised before exchange which has led to the sellers reducing their offer
4) The sales have fallen through on all three houses due to the seller of these houses rejecting the offers.
5) Market conditions mean the sellers now think the house is worth more than it was 10 months ago so have now rejected the original offer.

I don't think saying the sellers are time wasters is fair. 

They are very likely finding out that when they look for houses now the prices have gone up so they themselves need to increase the price of their own house.

it depends how minor the minor issues they were trying to get money off for really are, but surely if it's happened 3 times hey're either really unlucky, have unrealistic expectations or are looking for an excuse not to have to move.

Yes difficult to judge either way without knowing what the reasons are.  Its costing them money though each time they pull out so I assume they are valid reasons.

If spending £450k + on a house then you do need to be sure!

Spreadsheetman

I wonder if the sellers may be a bit unrealistic with the survey issues? Someone else's house is never going to be just the way you want it and normal wear and tear is routine. (if it is something major though then reducing the offer is fair enough)

TripleH

BV88, if you are  still planning to proceed, it might be worth setting a cut off time or if you accept the higher price put in conditions that the sale has to be done by x date or you walk away, I wouldn't do any further work on the purchase until they have found and are progressing with an onward purchase until they agree a provisional completion date with you.

My sarcastic comment was not too different to my response when the estate agents for the 2nd property we tried to buy came back to ask if we wanted to buy now at a higher price, with more stamp duty and in my opinion less chance of completing than previous. For context this would be the 4th time in 3 years that property has been on the market,vthe other 3 times a buyer has been found but the deal hasn't progressed.