EA accepting offers after sale agreed

Suspicious Dave

Hi there,

We are sale agreed on a house for nearly a month, €5k booking deposit paid. There was 1 other bidder at the time. I just received a call from the EA saying that the other bidder has come back with a new offer and that he is obliged to put it to the seller. Is this not wrong? Doesn't sale agreed mean just that? My solicitor is to call me back but does anyone know if we have any rights here?

zulfikarMD

I think its Moral responsibility of EA to remove the house from any websites they put on for sale if house has gone sale agreed and proceed to complete the SALE with same buyer which he agreed while taking deposit. And of course not entertain any offers from any other potential buyers.

L1011

zulfikarMD wrote: »

I think its Moral responsibility of EA to remove the house from any websites they put on for sale if house has gone sale agreed

I'd imagine they did - its a previous underbidder that has come back.

Gazumping is unfortunately totally legal here.

seamus

No, there are no rights here until you have signed contracts to purchase the house.

You can make a complain to IAVI, but since it was the other bidder who made the offer, they're unlikely to find the EA has done anything wrong.

bjak

A contract for the sale of land must be "evidenced in writing" for it to be enforceable. Not evidenced in writing- not enforceable.

Might be EA trying to squeeze a few more grand out of you using that old trustworthy bidder Mr. P Hanthom.

If you dont want to go any higher, play hardball with the EA, stress if you are a cash or mortgage approved buyer, stick to your price and time limit it. Alternatively you/your wife are most disappointed with this turn of events and want to withdraw altogether. Remember anecdotally many who have been approved in principle are having problems getting the actual mortgage approval. If you increase your offer, no guarantee that the "other" bidder wont increase his bid.

Friend selling house recently, one bidder, not sure if only one person viewed the house, he bid 20k under the asking and EA managed to get him to offer a further 10k.

There are similar posts to yours both on boards.ie and on thepropertypin.com

Let us know how you get on and best of luck

Victor

They are looking for extra money, whether there is someone else or not is another matter. It is time for calling of people's bluff - yours or theirs.

Tell them if the accept the other offer that you will be expecting you deposit back promptly, with interest and reimbursement for you expenses since you paid the deposit (you'll likely get neither).

D3PO

OP its perfectly legal but morral disgusting.

Just ring the EA now and say ok I want my deposit back tomorrow with interest due.

If the bidder is real so be it. If not when he crawls back to you looking to proceed with the sale drop your offer and point out its dropped due to the costs you incurred with your solicitor and for the inconveninece of him trying to allow you get gazumped.

Time to call their bluff.

wexford12

The owner of the house if they have any sense will not entertain the other offer its been a few weeks with your solicitor surely you are getting close to signing the contracts.It not fair on the owners or yourself to pull out if you still want this house just because the EA is an ass

pwurple

Sounds like you are being gazumped. Happened to us a decade ago. Got our deposit back, but still sickening.

Could be rubbish from the agent also. There are anecdotes of all sorts of tricks at the moment, including imaginary bids.

mikemac1

Friday tomorrow

Call in the morning, say that's fine, you won't be matching the new offer so they can go with that and you want your deposit back

Sometime before 4pm and 5pm the new bidder will have pulled out and you'll get a phonecall. Funny that

Let the EA sweat over the weekend for their silliness, you can do whatever you want on Monday, have a think about it.

jhegarty

Given the state of the market the moment I would reduce my offer by €5k.

Suspicious Dave

Thanks folks. Did some research after posting this and found that indeed legally we have no rights as such.

Spoke to EA again and he is waiting to hear back from the seller on the new bid.

Been through every possibility at this stage.

1) seller wants deal done quickly and proceeds with agreed deal - after all, how reliable can this other bidder be if they couldn't beat our offer a month ago but can now?

2) seller is desperate for cash and will take highest bid regardless

3) ea is bluffing. I don't see the benefit to the EA at this stage. Difference in their comission is hardly worth the risk of jeopardising our deal and delaying it considerably.

In any case, I'll let it play out for a few days but am prepared to walk away.

ahnowbrowncow

It'll be interesting to see if they're bluffing, let us know the outcome please

nacimroc

Don't forget to bitch and moan to everyone you know about the scumbag EA you had! Its not illegal to do what they did, but if everyone did this it would weed out the immoral ones and make EA's a little more trustworthy.

engineermike

Hi,
I don't see much recourse even if its 'sale agreed' - the terminology doesn't hold any legal weight.
Until the deed changes hands its really up the the vendor, i.e. - does he / she want a cash buyer or buyer with finance arranged, also the new bid must be substantially higher to risk alienating you or have you withdraw your offer & seek a refund. The vendor & the agent would be mad to be messing a buyer around over a couple of grand. I suppose its the old saying "a bird in the hand"
It does leave a bad taste in your mouth though :mad:
Mike f

Independance

I had a similar problem a few weeks ago. We viewed & at one point were only one to bid, were just at point of going sale ageed & EA phoned us at 9:45pm to say private bidder has put extra €10k on our bid but did so through the family not EA. They apparenlty left deposit down next morning.

This all happened 3 weeks ago, I phone the EA last week & he said the sale is going ahead but the buyers are waiting on bank paperwork to go through. I noticed the house was taken off daft.ie ( not on myhome.ie) yesterday and I drove past house last night & "For Sale" sign is still in garden.

Why would this not say Sale Agreed or it be posted Sale Agreed on daft.ie? Would this be because it was a private bidder, would it have been withdrawn. I can only now wait till the database goes live to see if the sale went ahead at all. I find this very fustrating, should i phone EA again to enquire what happened?

engineermike

Hi,
I'd say the EA normally takes there time in removing a property from these websites for the following reasons:
1. - waiting on completion of the sale / in case falls through and they have to re market the home
2. - Using the interest in the property by directing enquirers to similar properties in the same area in there portfolio.
3. - Those advertising drops for - " we have buyers for your property / area"

I'd say independence if your still interested - a call to the EA isn't going to do any harm to see if there's an update. If things fall through then at least the EA would be straight back on to you.
mike f

zulfikarMD

MYOB wrote: »

I'd imagine they did - its a previous underbidder that has come back.

Gazumping is unfortunately totally legal here.

I am not talking about legality here. I am just saying can EA not say "NO" to previous under bidder telling them house has gone sale agreed?

L1011

zulfikarMD wrote: »

I am not talking about legality here. I am just saying can EA not say "NO" to previous under bidder telling them house has gone sale agreed?

They can, but they're not obliged to.

Brian2850

The EA is actually obliged to report the offer if it comes in. People seem to forget who is giving instruction to the EA here, in 95% of cases where gazzumping occurs, the EA is acting on instructions from the seller of the house. The EA would have himself in hot water with the regulatory body if he/she was picking and choosing what offers to report.

Gazzumping is an awful practice that should be stopped (by some form of leglisation probably) but people should understand it more likely to be born out of greed by the seller than dishonesty by the EA. As already pointed out, another 5/10 k on the house price will not mean a great deal to the EA's fee.

seamus

zulfikarMD wrote: »

I am not talking about legality here. I am just saying can EA not say "NO" to previous under bidder telling them house has gone sale agreed?

They are required by law to tell the seller about all offers made on the house.

StillWaters

seamus wrote: »

zulfikarMD wrote: »

I am not talking about legality here. I am just saying can EA not say "NO" to previous under bidder telling them house has gone sale agreed?

They are required by law to tell the seller about all offers made on the house.

They are not just legally obliged to do so, they are morally obliged. They are acting on the sellers behalf.
Those who called the EA morally bankrupt / scumbag etc have no understanding of this.

Marcusm

StillWaters wrote: »

They are not just legally obliged to do so, they are morally obliged. They are acting on the sellers behalf.
Those who called the EA morally bankrupt / scumbag etc have no understanding of this.

It's a requirement in the code of conduct imposed by the Property Services Regulatory authority so it has more than "moral" connotations.