Should we pull out of this purchase?

Jaybee_16

Reading through the whole post, I would certainly walk away from this one.

Clive_Woody

Another vote for walking away. Life is too short for this kind of stress and there will be other houses.

trakky14

You're too good to these people to even entertain continuing with the purchase...move on and find something else!

Slinky

Your vendor thinks he has got you over a barrel and that you're desperate for this particular house as you have relatives nearby.

sheramber

No point in giving an ultimatum if you don't follow through.

Your vendor is banking on the fact that it is near your parents means you won't pull out.

Your parents should have sent hime packing when he approached them.

littlecactus

Thanks everyone for giving some external perspective. 

In fairness @sheramber we’ve not not followed through yet - we gave an ultimatum the seller hasn’t yet met and we haven’t yet acted on our side accordingly (proceeding with the mortgage adjustment / sale in general). I take your wider point though. 

And we appreciate knowledge of my parents’ proximity won’t help. But this was sadly unavoidable due to other overlaps in who knows who locally. 

I can see most people would walk away. I think my own struggle is that we’re moving from out of area and nothing similar has come up in a while and so it can feel a bit “this or nothing” at times, and that’s certainly the only reason we’re still involved in the purchase at all at this point. 

BikingBud

littlecactus said:

I appreciate strangers on the internet can’t really tell us what to do, but we’re looking for a sense check… 

An attempt at a short version:

⁃ We’re buying a house that has been down valued by the mortgage company from £400,000 to £380,000

⁃ We originally offered £385,000 and felt this was fair but the vendor wouldn’t budge from £400,000 (a reduction from asking price of £410,000, itself reduced from the original £425,000)

⁃ The house had been on the market for 6 months before we offered, with two previous sales falling through for unknown reasons

⁃ The vendor has refused a roof survey despite our surveyor recommending and us having some concerns from how it looks

⁃ The vendor has been difficult throughout the sale in a hundred small and large ways; including refusing lots of snagging (they redeveloped the house, they’re selling it uninhabited) even though they said they wouldn’t come below £400,000 due to the cost of likely snagging 

⁃ Our surveyor also flagged concerns with the drains, which we arranged a cctv survey for. This couldn’t be completed due to root and debris blockages and they ignored our requests to discuss next steps and said they wouldn’t speak to us until our mortgage came through 

⁃ They put the house back on the market with no notice after 6 weeks as we didn’t have a mortgage yet (our provider is slow, but no actual issues and the lack of agreed completion date due to unresolved issues is slowing it down as they prioritise by completion date) - we felt as retaliation for our request to discuss the drain issue 

⁃ They / their solicitor are refusing to speak to our solicitor about a planning condition we don’t think has been discharged (a condition of redevelopment was returning some greenery to the front of the house before habitation; this hasn’t happened and aside from the vendor saying “it doesn’t matter” we’ve had no further reassurances); the vendor says our solicitor is asking “stupid questions about silly drawings” (those drawings being the plans he submitted, which then were given a written condition saying greenery must be restored as depicted)

⁃ Due to the down valuation, should we continue we have three options:

     ⁃ Put in £14,000 more to keep the current LTV and so mortgage rate

     ⁃ Accept a rate that’s now 1% higher and while doable begins to stretch us financially (this rate has gone up 0.5% while waiting for a response from the vendor)

     ⁃ Ask the vendor to reduce the price; but we know they will say no, so this feels pointless

Last week, we gave the vendor an ultimatum that we would only continue with the purchase if he: instructed his solicitor to re-engage with ours on remaining queries, work with us to agree a mutually convenient completion date, set out a plan for how and when he would deal with the drains to allow us to complete our cctv survey, and took the house off the market. One week later and he still hasn’t even acknowledged this ultimatum.

The vendor has subsequently invited my parents (who live round the corner from the property) to witness (on our behalf) him having his own drainage survey done. He was also present and he used this as an opportunity to try to pressure my parents into agreeing a completion date of next week for us, despite him continuing to refuse to even acknowledge the conditions of us continuing the sale that we set out a week ago.

We like the house. It isn’t perfect. It’s very much at the top of our price bracket. It needs work, including just basics like installing aerial sockets, installing internet access points and phone lines, cutting holes in newly installed cupboards to allow washer/dryer connection. Then as a matter of taste there’s money to restore the garden. We really like the area, and there are limited other options, especially at the size we want. This is why we’ve stuck with it so far, but we’re starting to question our commitment. 

We’re aware that the vendor’s extreme rudeness and unreasonable behaviour throughout make it hard to be objective here. 

Is this all quite par for the course and we should stick with it if we really want it? Or are we mad to be considering throwing even more money in, especially in this economic climate? 

Why the new post?

You had advice on your previous thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/79432019#Comment_79432019

Repeated as follows:

"Given what you have posted here, I would be very wary about some of the risks and I would suggest that it might be good to allow it to go, especially as the developer will be looking to maximise their profit on the flip and if your funds to cover any surprises are limited."

Seems like it's time to walk.

littlecactus

BikingBud said:

Why the new post?

You had advice on your previous thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/79432019#Comment_79432019

Repeated as follows:

"Given what you have posted here, I would be very wary about some of the risks and I would suggest that it might be good to allow it to go, especially as the developer will be looking to maximise their profit on the flip and if your funds to cover any surprises are limited."

Seems like it's time to walk.

Thank you again for your advice. I suppose the new post is because last time I was asking if it was fair to be annoyed they’d readvertised the house (and advice was mixed on that point). While some did suggest we walk away from the sale then, that wasn’t really the question then but is now. Thank you, though. 

I thought about linking to the original post but this new one was already quite long. Apologies if it would have been more helpful to have linked them. 

trix-a-belle

Standingstrong said:

Walk away!!! infact  RUN 

This!
& as they have acted like children not even bothering to acknowledge let alone reply i'd tell your solicitor to immediately stop any work (if you haven't already) and then book a viewing on another property with the same agent (even if its unsuitable) to kick the point home that you're moving on & not bother contacting them again.

Could your parents do a bit of leaflet dropping to suitable houses in the area you're looking at to see if there is anyone on the fence about going to market which might prompt some movement & fresh options.

secla

Id also walk, refusing to allow the roof and drains checked would ring bells but the fact they are a developer would say to me they definitely know there is something that needs doing.

You seem set on carrying on though so all id say is if you do stop making threats you have no intention of keeping as it puts you in an even weaker position going forward. I would tell your solicitor to stop any work until the point there solicitor stars replying and just hold out.

As a side note why does the developer think that agreeing dates and timelines with your parents holds any water ?