Just been gazumped...

BarelySentientAI

Bigphil1474 said:

 and EA should have not accepted any more offers as soon as you provided affordability evidence. 

The EA is not allowed to do that.  They must pass all offers on to the seller.

Albermarle

nicmyles said:

I just wouldn't entertain the idea of buying a house from someone who'd accepted my offer and then later rejected it. You have to have trust in the other party when buying property.

There are some situations though where you probably have to be realistic. One situation could be where the conveyancing process takes a long time, and in the meantime the house market was burning hot and prices were going up fast.

PRDMKT

We are now offer accepted at £332,500 - absolutely eyewatering for us, but it's around the fair market value for it, we did have it at a steal previously, but that still doesn't make this any less painful, but i guess most importantly we really like it. 

Someone else had spotted the that it was listed at good value and decided to take us for a ride... these things happen i guess... 

silvercar

Twice I’ve walked away. 

Once we had agreed the price with our buyer and three weeks later we found they had put a similar offer on a property for sale by an acquaintance. Spoke to the acquaintance (we had a mutual friend) who was absolutely livid. We both phoned our respective estate agents and withdrew from the sale. The buyer was upset, apparently, as was our estate agent.

Once we were gazumped near the end of the purchase, surveys done, mortgage offer received and the seller had another offer £30k/  3.5% more. EA kept phoning us and asking us to give a higher revised offer. Ignored all the calls for 3 days, until the EA appeared at our door. He got short shrift when he suggested it was rude of us not to reply to his calls as that had left the seller unsure what to do all this time. The gazumpers didn’t buy in the end, seller had to re-market. Took them an extra 6 months to move and they ended up paying more for their onward purchase.

Don’t regret either decision.

RHemmings

BarelySentientAI said:

Bigphil1474 said:

 and EA should have not accepted any more offers as soon as you provided affordability evidence. 

The EA is not allowed to do that.  They must pass all offers on to the seller.

The EA can not pass on offers if the vendor asks them not to. E.g. to not pass on any offers less than a certain amount. And, I believe that a vendor can say to not accept or pass on any more offers, in which case the EA doesn't have to. 

I believe that your point is that this (the gazumping) is down to the vendor, not the EA. In which case I agree. But, I think it needs to be clarified a bit as above. 

As this comes down to the vendor, to my eyes there remain issues of trust. Though, I can see that the OP is proceeding.

PRDMKT said:

We are now offer accepted at £332,500 - absolutely eyewatering for us, but it's around the fair market value for it, we did have it at a steal previously, but that still doesn't make this any less painful, but i guess most importantly we really like it. 

Someone else had spotted the that it was listed at good value and decided to take us for a ride... these things happen i guess... 

I hope that things go well from here on in and that there are no further issues. Crossed fingers for you. My post above isn't trying to say that you shouldn't proceed. But, I would remain wary if I was in your position. 

ben-dover

PRDMKT said:

We are now offer accepted at £332,500 - absolutely eyewatering for us, but it's around the fair market value for it, we did have it at a steal previously, but that still doesn't make this any less painful, but i guess most importantly we really like it. 

Someone else had spotted the that it was listed at good value and decided to take us for a ride... these things happen i guess... 

If you're happy, then that's it, really. As for it being a bit of a bargain before, the agent who listed it sounds like it has been undervalued. 

I've seen it a couple of times before where the seller thought they were getting an extra 10k only to be dragged out for a couple of months and then asked to reduce the price otherwise the new buyer will pull out. 

Murphybear

propertyrental said:

Good advice above but I'm a stubborn and grumpy old man - I hate gazumpers and would give them short shrift. Walk away unless they revert to the agreed price.

But of course it's a personal decision and you may want that particular property enough to be will to be taken for a ride pay a bit extra.....

We were house hunting some years ago.  We found a house we liked and offered £2k under the asking price. Our offer was accepted.  Some weeks later we had a phone call from the EA saying the vendors had received a higher offer, would we be prepared to match it.  Our response was a straightforward “no”.  Roll on a few more weeks.  Another call from the EA, the sale had fallen through, were we still interested.  The EA couldn’t understand why, in polite terms, we told him to naff off 

We found a beautiful bungalow much closer to work and £12k less than the house.  

Oh, the fun & games of buying and selling property

RHemmings

Murphybear said:

propertyrental said:

Good advice above but I'm a stubborn and grumpy old man - I hate gazumpers and would give them short shrift. Walk away unless they revert to the agreed price.

But of course it's a personal decision and you may want that particular property enough to be will to be taken for a ride pay a bit extra.....

We were house hunting some years ago.  We found a house we liked and offered £2k under the asking price. Our offer was accepted.  Some weeks later we had a phone call from the EA saying the vendors had received a higher offer, would we be prepared to match it.  Our response was a straightforward “no”.  Roll on a few more weeks.  Another call from the EA, the sale had fallen through, were we still interested.  The EA couldn’t understand why, in polite terms, we told him to naff off 

We found a beautiful bungalow much closer to work and £12k less than the house.  

Oh, the fun & games of buying and selling property

From a rather imperfect memory, I think I read somewhere that the majority of house purchases where one side tries to change the price just before exchange (not after survey) fall through. Trust can be important. 

YoungBlueEyes

As has been repeatedly mentioned - trust. It's twisty enough as it is out there, never mind adding another layer on to it.

When we were house hunting we offered on a house and the ea thought that would secure it (it was just under asking). Then he rang back to say he'd had another offer from a person who hadn't viewed but his granny used to live on that street (or something). His offer was AP+20% and did we want to match/beat it? My answer - "Aww nostalgia eh? How nice for him. We're out."

These games will continue as long as people keep playing them. Start saying no and meaning it.

Good to hear you've had another offer accepted now OP, but I hope you told the ea that it was conditional on no more viewings and marked SSTC on the website etc?