House buying - pulling out can be annoying too
Discussion
I've just read the "Gazumping" thread and there was an entry in there that made me think:
A week and a half later, they had a survey done and promptly pulled out - I think I did a thread on this, so I won't go over that again. Their grounds for pulling out were, clearly, that they didn't want the house as the survey pointed out all the obvious things that you get in an old property which pissed us off.
What was, however, the most annoying was the fact that we'd had a survey done on the other house, which we then had to pull out of and initiated legal fees - all in, it cost us about £700 which we, obviously, had no way of recovering.
This isn't a "feel sorry for me" thread as I accept that "s
t happens" - but it's really infuriating that you go to the extent of incurring costs only for the buyer to pull out for, what ended up being, no good reason - and there's no comeback.
Why can't we have a market where if you put in an offer, then if you pull out, the costs are passed on to you, unless your reasons are genuine and not just because you can't be arsed. Is it Scotland where once an offer is put in, it's binding? If so, can we have that here please?
davidjpowell said:
Not really at that stage. It's when people have incurred survey and legal costs i start to feel sorry.
Last year we sold the house - subject to contract - the buyers saw the house, said it was what they wanted. They put in an offer which we accepted and all was well in the world - they went away on holiday and we proceeded to get a survey done on a house that we really loved and wanted and initiated legal costs.A week and a half later, they had a survey done and promptly pulled out - I think I did a thread on this, so I won't go over that again. Their grounds for pulling out were, clearly, that they didn't want the house as the survey pointed out all the obvious things that you get in an old property which pissed us off.
What was, however, the most annoying was the fact that we'd had a survey done on the other house, which we then had to pull out of and initiated legal fees - all in, it cost us about £700 which we, obviously, had no way of recovering.
This isn't a "feel sorry for me" thread as I accept that "s
t happens" - but it's really infuriating that you go to the extent of incurring costs only for the buyer to pull out for, what ended up being, no good reason - and there's no comeback.Why can't we have a market where if you put in an offer, then if you pull out, the costs are passed on to you, unless your reasons are genuine and not just because you can't be arsed. Is it Scotland where once an offer is put in, it's binding? If so, can we have that here please?
digimeistter said:
I couldn't agree more! Once the deal has been agreed this should be legally binding (subject to survey).
Whilst I agree, on what grounds would the survey give the buyer the right to pull out?? House needs undepinning or has a spot of rot on a window that needs repair??I can't find the thread, but in our case - to name a couple - the roof tiles "looked too heavy" (they've been there about 30 odd years), there was evidence of woodworm in the roof (it'd been treated, but obviously not cleared up properly - we've got the receipts/guarantees), there were no window plinths (it's a 150 year old cottage FFS) and a few others.
It's just a few things that you'd expect from an old cottage really - but it seemed very much like they were using the survey to pull out. Funnily enough the estate agent told me that the next day they'd put in an offer on another house which said a lot really.
It's just a few things that you'd expect from an old cottage really - but it seemed very much like they were using the survey to pull out. Funnily enough the estate agent told me that the next day they'd put in an offer on another house which said a lot really.
GT03ROB said:
digimeistter said:
I couldn't agree more! Once the deal has been agreed this should be legally binding (subject to survey).
Whilst I agree, on what grounds would the survey give the buyer the right to pull out?? House needs undepinning or has a spot of rot on a window that needs repair??Almost all offers in Scotland are now made subject to survey, so the system works well enough. It is quite hard to pull out though and generally people don't. When I was first looking for a flat in Edinburgh 15 years or so ago, the norm was to get a survey done and then put your offer in. If it wasn't the highest then you had wasted the cost of the survey. You could easily go through a couple of grand before you found somewhere.
james_tigerwoods said:
I can't find the thread, but in our case - to name a couple - the roof tiles "looked too heavy" (they've been there about 30 odd years), there was evidence of woodworm in the roof (it'd been treated, but obviously not cleared up properly - we've got the receipts/guarantees), there were no window plinths (it's a 150 year old cottage FFS) and a few others.
It's just a few things that you'd expect from an old cottage really - but it seemed very much like they were using the survey to pull out. Funnily enough the estate agent told me that the next day they'd put in an offer on another house which said a lot really.
Sounds exactly like what happened to me. My house dates from 1841. Buyers had a full homebuyer survey, Surveyor was there 3 hours. He even went through all the kitchen cupboards and took the panel off the shower cubicle! Anyway, at the end I asked him what the verdict was - "fine nothing unexpected", I then get a call from my EA saying buyers had a 32 page report of 'faults' and wanted to discuss. I disagreed with most but agreed to reduce by another 19K as they had no chain. They then pulled out deciding to buy a brand new house instead costing me £500 to the solicitor and 2 months marketing lost.It's just a few things that you'd expect from an old cottage really - but it seemed very much like they were using the survey to pull out. Funnily enough the estate agent told me that the next day they'd put in an offer on another house which said a lot really.
digimeistter said:
I couldn't agree more! Once the deal has been agreed this should be legally binding (subject to survey).
I agree with this, on one proviso.The seller should have to provide a full comprehensive survey to all interested parties.
As it stands (here in Scotland), an offer is practically legally-binding, and therefore if you have 3 interested parties in a particular property, then each party has to commission their own survey. On balance, it will be cheaper for everybody if the seller provides the survey.
The seller may be intially pissed off with this arrangement, but I'm sure will soon see the benefit when he/she doesn't have to pay for 3 seperate surveys on the 3 properties he/she is interested in purchasing.
The introduction of this needs to be carefully planned, and introduced when it is ready, and not rushed in like the current waste-of-time HIPs.
We've just had our chain break down a week before we were supposed to move. The cretins buying the house of the lady buying ours pulled out because their ideal move date got delayed by one whole week. 
This was a date that we or our buyer never even agreed to. I'm tempted to find him and get the value of my bill from him in broken windows
Oh, and my wife is 8 and a half months pregnant too so were really looking forward to briefly getting settled in the house before the new arrival.
This was a date that we or our buyer never even agreed to. I'm tempted to find him and get the value of my bill from him in broken windows
Oh, and my wife is 8 and a half months pregnant too so were really looking forward to briefly getting settled in the house before the new arrival.
cliffe_mafia said:
We've just had our chain break down a week before we were supposed to move. The cretins buying the house of the lady buying ours pulled out because their ideal move date got delayed by one whole week.
This was a date that we or our buyer never even agreed to. I'm tempted to find him and get the value of my bill from him in broken windows
Oh, and my wife is 8 and a half months pregnant too so were really looking forward to briefly getting settled in the house before the new arrival.
Now that, is really, really sThis was a date that we or our buyer never even agreed to. I'm tempted to find him and get the value of my bill from him in broken windows
Oh, and my wife is 8 and a half months pregnant too so were really looking forward to briefly getting settled in the house before the new arrival.
t 
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