Estate Agent not passing on offer

paulfoel

Made an offer on a property - no response estate agent.
Chased them and they phoned me. "No vendor wants asking price".

I had a feeling then they hadn't even sent it to the vendor because they said "they had discussed in the morning meeting".

Anyway, I increased my offer- same again no response. So I emailed to chase again and insisted they confirm it had been sent to the vendor. (and I CCed the branch manager).

Today I've had an official letter confirming offer has been submitted.

Pretty sure they didn't even submit my first offer and have only submitted this time because I escalated it.

Dodgy behaviour?

user1977

Nothing dodgy about it if their client had already given them parameters around what offers they'd be interested in.

Penguin_

Agree with above, if I was selling a house I'd be telling the agent "Please don't contact me with offers below £xxx".

FlorayG

'm pretty sure they are obliged to pass on every offer - because although last time I sold I made it 100% clear I was not interested in offers and I get on very well with my estate agent, he still called me with every offer and waited for me to say "no". I asked him not to call me with low offers and he told me he had to

user1977

FlorayG said:

I'm pretty sure they are obliged to pass on every offer

They're not. The vendor can tell the agent in advance what sort of offers they're interested in.

millie

They should tell the buyer that if the vendor is not going to accept offers in that case.

Hoenir

millie said:

They should tell the buyer that if the vendor is not going to accept offers in that case.

They have. 

Chased them and they phoned me. "No vendor wants asking price".

vacheron

Repeating the masses, but one of the advantages of an estate agent is that they are engaged (and paid) by the seller to filter out the noise and only let through what is in their client's interest or instruction. 

The same way Brad Pitt's  showbiz agent filters out all the unappealing approaches from the industry. 

paulfoel

FlorayG said:

'm pretty sure they are obliged to pass on every offer - because although last time I sold I made it 100% clear I was not interested in offers and I get on very well with my estate agent, he still called me with every offer and waited for me to say "no". I asked him not to call me with low offers and he told me he had to

thats what I thought they had to do

user1977

From the Property Ombudsman's Code of Practice:

"By law, you must tell sellers as soon as is reasonably possible about all offers that you receive at any time until contracts have been exchanged unless the offer is an amount or type which the seller has specifically instructed you, in writing, not to pass on"

Hoenir

Bottom line is that an Estate Agent only gets paid when the sale completes. Defies all logic that an EA would intentionally block a valid offer. Another myth that perpetuates on socal media. One can only assume through a lack of business acunum.