Can/should my estate agent give me info on the full purchase chain?

Brie

Frankly I think buying and selling is stressful enough when you know those either side of you. I can imagine what my blood pressure would be like if I knew about everyone in a chain and could imagine all the things that might go wrong.

jez9999

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81987670#Comment_81987670

They can go wrong, whether you know about it or not.

Albermarle

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81987670#Comment_81987670

Also due to the stress of homebuying in a chain, you might well fall out/start arguing with some of them, especially any difficult characters, and then get even more stressed.

The OP is right in that it can be a very difficult and frustrating process, but I am not sure having 5 sets of buyers/sellers estate agents and solicitors all having regular contact with each other would really help the process along. Probably the opposite.

Exodi

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81987518#Comment_81987518

While I'm minded to agree with you, I'd be careful of thinking that grass is always greener.

The inverse system (where, unlike the UK where nothing is legally binding until exchange of contracts at the end, the initial offer itself is legally binding) exists is many countries across the world.

My parents lived in France so had some experience with this and it's not all upside. Just to give some examples:

The offer (known as offre d'achat) if accepted by the seller (via a contract known as compromis de vente) is legally binding on both parties, and is commonly in place within a week or two. So if the buyers dream house comes up the week after they made the offer, it's tough. Property prices collapse 20%, tough.

Likewise on the seller, if house prices rocket or discover their house is sat on top of an oil pocket, tough. I think this catches expats out a lot, who make offers a lot more carelessly or liberally.

In fact even if someone in the chain dies, the process would not be cancelled, just halted while probate is sorted. The heirs would still be obligated to fulfil the transaction.

You could also argue that sellers have it easy in the UK, because the status quo is for every different prospective buyer to pay for a survey on the sellers house.

In fact, sorry to pick on Bigphil1474 but from their comment "Ours was sold to a FTB but they pulled out after the survey. Managed to get another buyer fairly quickly who was more knowledgeable - we shared the previous buyers survey and they got their own, plus we'd had a bit of remedial work done." some may see that as very unfair on the first buyer who had to spend their own money conducting a survey on Bigphil1474's house, which highlighted an issue that Bigphil1474 may or may not have been aware of, prompting them to undertake remedial work for the benefit of future buyers.

Personally this way of doing things has never made sense to me. I'm aware in 2007 the government tried to change this with Home Information Packs (HIPs), but I understand it was not popular due to the conflict of interests, and lenders oftentimes refused them. It was also unpopular with sellers as it frontloaded several hundred pound to selling their house during a slow market. It was a shame it was abandoned so quickly and the kinks weren't worked through.

This leads to the UK adopting a principle of caveat emptor, 'let the buyer beware' and unfortunately encourages contemptible behaviours, like painting/covering cracks or damp.

In France, as you can expect, the seller is responsible for paying for the survey (known as DDT). Unlike the UK, they operate a principle of "devoir d’information réciproque", which means they must disclose anything that would otherwise cause the buyer to change their mind.

It's also worth noting that while France is more secure, it does take longer.

With all that said, I'm still minded to agree with you and would prefer the French system. It's not just the potential issues like who pays for the survey or hiding issues like I mentioned, but also gazumping/gazundering. I've never had it happen to me, but I truly feel awful when I hear of it happening to others. It should not be allowed to happen.

But to offer a conclusion, I'd say the grass isn't always greener, and there are pro's and con's to both systems.

jez9999

The grass isn't always greener… but the French system is greener.

As you said, multiple buyers having to do surveys / more detailed checks from builders or whatever to investigate potential problems is stupid and redundant if its being done more than once and totally unfair on the buyer whose purchase fails through no fault of their own.

Is the French system actually slower? I've been told by estate agents that even if things don't fall through it can take 21 weeks in the UK to get to completion, that sure sounds like the slowest system in the world.

As for the buyer's dream house coming up, I have no sympathy if they want to pull out. I'd fully expect them to be committed to buying the house they promised to buy.

Brie

But it all comes down to what would you do if you did know about the rest of the chain? Would you refuse to sell to someone or buy from another? I'm sure the last time we moved our buyer and our seller would have been horrified to know that our buying/selling was dependent on also selling another property owned by my MiL and that was a right pig of a situation. Start to finish the whole process was 8 months. If it wasn't dependent on MiL's property selling it would have taken half that time.

Another consideration is that if you have 5 different solicitors corresponding that's going to up the costs significantly. And there's also the possibility that one of more would have to bow out when they discovered they were dealing with more than one part of the chain.

Exodi

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81987732#Comment_81987732

It's definitely slower, it's funny because this is a forum about the UK, but you'll see exactly the same sorts of complaints in France about the speed of transactions. There's countless jokes about notaires (the equivalent of a conveyancing solicitor in the UK). Google 'slow notaire jokes france' and you'll stumble upon a few! I think residents of every country conclude their country is the worst at everything, I think we are all a bit pessimistic at heart!

Hope things improve for you.

saajan_12

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6667009/can-should-my-estate-agent-give-me-info-on-the-full-purchase-chain

Is it reasonable for me to ask them to just email me all the information?

The key is what 'all' the information is. A table of names, property addresses and agent names is not useful. Rightmove is the last to be updated and the agents aren't going to entertain calls from all 5 other parties in the chain.

What would actually help is a clear, regularly updated progress status on each one, eg whether its SSTC, whether survey is booked, whether searches are received, etc. That could be anonimised to avoid any data protection issues, eg just "Buyer 1 is a FTB, progress is x, " etc. However you may be asking your agent to be a good agent - no reason they can't but not everyone is a good agent.

ExEstateAgent

Your EA should be carrying out sales progression - that is keeping tabs up and down the chain as much as they can do, and feeding back information to you as and when appropriate.

Some buyers expect to hear daily updates which is unreasonable. Most solicitors/conveyancers will deal with your file in rotation along with the rest of their caseload. Constant chasing will slow the process down as they'll be spending time answering impatiant clients instead of doing the actual work.

Most parties beyond your buyer/vendors won't engage with you directly.

Albermarle

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81987787#Comment_81987787

There are regular posts/posters in many MSE forums, that take the view that somehow every UK system is worse than in other countries. Having worked for many years with many different nationalities, they all complain pretty much the same about their own Govt/bureaucracy /taxes etc etc .