Stressed out over house sale

bobbysands81

Gazzer, you in Dublin 11 by any chance?

gazzer

@ bobbysands81. No dont live up in D11. Why do you ask?

Jo King

gazzer wrote: »

If they have mortgage approval do you not think they are going to play every seller in your estate off each other? You could ask them to make a final bid on the basis that you want a contract signed within 48 hours

Can I ask them to sign the contracts before the loan cheque issues though? I thought that the buyers would have to have the funds from the bank before they could sign?

No they do not. They get a letter of offer from the bank. They sign a contract with a closing date some weeks later. They turn up at the closing with their loan cheque drawn down the day before the closing.

gazzer

@ Jo King. Thanks for that reply. I am going to ring the estate agents tomorrow morning so and tell them to convey to the buyers that I want the contract signed ASAP or else I am withdrawing the house.

gazzer

I decided to take Jo Kings advice and ring the EA to say that I wanted the contracts signed as soon as or I was pulling the house.

Then lady I wanted to speak to wasnt there but the person who answered the phone said to me that she had an update on the sale.

She proceeds to tell me that the buyers broker rang this morning to say that he was only waiting on 2 bits of information from the buyers and that it would be all systems go:

Naturally I was a bit perplexed and I informed the person I spoke to that:
1. The broker said the exact same thing 3 weeks ago
2. One of her colleagues had rang me on the other day to say that the buyers had gotten rid of their broker and that they had applied for a mortgage themselves.

This is just mental. Obviously the people who work in the office dont speak to one another. I cant believe the amount of misinformation I am getting.

scab-e

At the moment this is a fairly normal situation to be in. House sales are taking far longer than before. The buyer has no incentive to close because every month that it drags on your house is worth less. If your house is selling for 500K, then it's losing about 5K a month. After three months of closing the deal, the buyer can just ask you for 15K off the price. If you refuse they can just buy from someone else at the reduced price.

You would be in a better position if you had another buyer in waiting, even at a lower price. You should also accept that prices are falling and offer a lower price based on a completion date.

You could of course rent it out and lose 50K plus over the next year. I know a buyer whose house has fallen from 1.2m to 800K in the past 2 years. 10K is nothing.

Jo King

gazzer wrote: »

I decided to take Jo Kings advice and ring the EA to say that I wanted the contracts signed as soon as or I was pulling the house.

Then lady I wanted to speak to wasnt there but the person who answered the phone said to me that she had an update on the sale.

She proceeds to tell me that the buyers broker rang this morning to say that he was only waiting on 2 bits of information from the buyers and that it would be all systems go:

Naturally I was a bit perplexed and I informed the person I spoke to that:
1. The broker said the exact same thing 3 weeks ago
2. One of her colleagues had rang me on the other day to say that the buyers had gotten rid of their broker and that they had applied for a mortgage themselves.

This is just mental. Obviously the people who work in the office dont speak to one another. I cant believe the amount of misinformation I am getting.

You are being treated like the proverbial donkey. Every time they think you are going to pull out, they dangle another carrot. They do not care if it is true or not. Fire your agent.

The_Conductor

Jo King wrote: »

You are being treated like the proverbial donkey. Every time they think you are going to pull out, they dangle another carrot. They do not care if it is true or not. Fire your agent.

Unfortunately- I'd have to agree.
Fire the estate agent. They are supposed to be acting on your behalf, and in your interests. It doesn't sound as though they are.......
Fire them and get yourself a new Estate Agent........

Treehouse72

Could I ask OP how long you have been trying to sell for? It is my understanding that even a smooth transaction can take many weeks to close.

gazzer

Could I ask OP how long you have been trying to sell for? It is my understanding that even a smooth transaction can take many weeks to close

The buyers put a booking deposit on the house 10 weeks ago so thats how long the process has goine on for so far.

I rang the EA this evening and demanded to talk to the boss. Got to talk to him and I told him of my experiences with his company and the buyers over the last number of weeks and how I was totally confused as to what was going one.

He apologised for all the mix up and tried to persuade me not to take the house of the market as if I decided to rent and went to sell next year I might have to sell for even less... Very nice of him to be worried about me :rolleyes:

Anyways I gave him 5 questions to put to the buyers and I asked him to ring them in the morning to get the answers to these questions and to ring me back. I told him that if I dont get satisfactory answers to these questions I am pulling the house from the market.

Supercell

Gazzer, I think you are letting emotion getting in the way of one of the biggest financial decisions you will probably ever make.

Look at the facts:-

1) Your current neighbours cannot sell at the price you currently are sale agreed on and they have no viewings
2) Worst case scenario you may have to drop original price by 10k to complete the sale.

Is 10k enough to loose the sale and have the stress of a house you cannot sell and don't want to live in anymore around your neck?

Long term house prices do tend to track inflation ..otherwise no-one would be able to afford a house anymore, think about it.

Prices are wildly overvalued at present, theres only one direction they are likely to go for another two years or so probably.

If they rise in the future will they ever rise to the current sale agreed price plus inflation?..again think about..

Sell the house and move on with your live, I strongly believe pulling out now may be something you would sorely regret in years to come.

gazzer

Sell the house and move on with your live, I strongly believe pulling out now may be something you would sorely regret in years to come.

@Supercell. I am more than happy to sell them the house (even with the 10 grand drop). My problem is that I dont know if I am coming or going with the buyers. One day they have sacked their broker, the next day they havnt. One day they have to have a medical, the next day they dont have to etc.

If I knew for definite that they wanted to buy the house then I would let the sale proceed. However the way things are at the moment I dont have a clue if they are playing me or just not as proactive as they should be in closing this sale. I mean there has to come a point where I have to decide if the buyers are dicking me around or if they are serious.

brendan4

The buyer is messing you around... they aren't serious. Forget about them, move on.

Zambia

Hi gazzer

I really feel for you this process is terrible. You basically are ripping your hair out over this and its not even that bad yet.

You have been gazumped by the way but not badly. Your EA is acting like most EA's I know. The storys and misinformation are common. You are not alone nor are you the first and you will not be the last to go through this.

You are having some luck you want to sell and have a buyer that has not pulled out. That is offering a least market value.

I lost three houses in my last sale waiting on the buyers, it could be worse

gazzer

Just thought I would post to give you an update to my ongoing house sale saga. Well the buyers signed the contracts, paid the 10% deposit and we signed out part yesterday. Have to be out of the house in 2 weeks. Im so happy, over the moon in fact that it is finally nearing an end. It has been such a stressful 3 months. I dont know how anybody with kids or who are waiting to buy another house does it. At least in our case we are just going to be renting.

Thanks everybody for your replies over the last while. I really appreciate them. I reckon that whatever house I buy next (in a year or 2) will be the house I am going to stay in. Dont think I could go through that stress again.

Cheers.

G.

astrofool

brendan4 wrote: »

The buyer is messing you around... they aren't serious. Forget about them, move on.

Without poking fun at some user's (above is just an example), it's amazing how wrong people on forums can be.

Did they end up signing at the original price, or did you have to drop it?

gazzer

@ astrofool. Originally the buyers agreed to buy the house for 280,000. I had told the estate agent to price out house at that figure after I had walked around the estate and took note of the house numbers where houses for for sale and then checked the net to see how much was being asked.

Pricing the house at 280,000 meant that our house was the cheapest in the estate by 5000 euro (though a few houses were asking 300,000).

A couple of weeks back the buyers said they could only now get a mortgage of 270,000 from the bank. We agreed to the drop in price and that is the price the house has sold for. Im not too bothered about the drop in price as in the 3 months since the house went sale agreed there are 2 houses for sale in the estate for 260,000.

The_Conductor

Well done Gazzer- it is a relief. You probably had the right approach to bite the bullet and run- particularly given the market situation.

S.

gazzer

Cheers smccarrick. It is certainly a relief. I think I will take a nice week long holiday soon enough and just chill out. Starting in my new job in a new county in 2 weeks time.. really looking forward to it. Definately going to rent though for a year or so.