Estate Agents. 2 For Price Of 1

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Nantastic

Guest
Right.

Serious question folks. FTB and trying to get the best deal. But I feel a little guilty.

I'm playing to Estate Agents off each other to see who can get me the best price. They both know now that we were speaking to two about the one house.

I'm in no rush. I can wait, but I know the house needs to be sold.

Does that make me a bad person? Is is wrong? Or is it a case of; screw it - I'm not going to be shafted on the house.

Thanks
 
No it doesn't make you a bad person. There was a time when EAs were shafting everyone (see Prime Time investigates program into the Estate Agent industry). A property is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. Decide on a price stick to it and don't let any flash Estate Agent change your mind.
 
Sorry folks - but what on earth are you talking about?

If you want to buy a house, offer what you want to offer and leave it at that. It really is as simple as that. If your offer is not accepted, buy another house.

From the OP's post, s/he patently is well able to manage the situation, it is very much a buyers market and there really is no need to "screw" or "shaft" anyone - EA's included.

In the end, it is for a vendor to decide on price and any price drop reflects only minimally on the EA's commission. EA's are paid by the vendor and their loyalties, responsibilities and obligations are to the vendor only - not the purchaser.

I am aware of the shift in the market and have acted for vendors in recent times who have felt very aggrieved about the behaviour of (some of) the purchasers. Gazundering is when you agree a price and then steadily reduce the offer over a period of time. This has happened to a number of my clients and it is very distressing. My view is simple - it is despicable behaviour - offer your price and stick with it. If you want to go lower, or it is your intention when making the offer to go lower again, then think of the vendor.

It was not nice when it was happening to purchasers and it is equally not nice when happening to vendors.

mf
 
MF1, despite the fact that both EA are spouting complete rubbish to me and buying from a builder who is going into liquidation and is basically trying to sell a shell?
 
Perhaps I am not making myself clear. As it happens, I am a solicitor and I see very clearly what is happening in the market place.

"MF1, despite the fact that both EA are spouting complete rubbish to me and buying from a builder who is going into liquidation and is basically trying to sell a shell? "

And you can see what they are offering you - so whats the problem? Offer what you are willing to offer and leave it. Or engage with them, play games with them, have fun with them, toy with them, waste their time, walk away, buy something else.....

It seems to me that you have a very clear grasp of your own situation so I just do not see the point of this:

"Serious question folks. FTB and trying to get the best deal. But I feel a little guilty.

I'm playing to Estate Agents off each other to see who can get me the best price. They both know now that we were speaking to two about the one house.

I'm in no rush. I can wait, but I know the house needs to be sold.

Does that make me a bad person? Is is wrong? Or is it a case of; screw it - I'm not going to be shafted on the house."

If you are willing to play them off against each other, as you clearly are, then you are behaving as badly as you think they are behaving and are not in a position to criticise their business dealings.

mf
 
What rubbish. Sellers, developers and estate agents have been happy enough to screw over buyers for the past 15 years. Gazumping didn't just occur occasionally; it was rampant.

Now the situation has turned, those buyers are, well, meanies. They should just hand over the asking price and be jolly glad they have a house over their heads.

Nantastic - ignore the VIs - you might as well be asking turkeys what flavour stuffing they would like shoved up their This post will be deleted if not edited to remove bad language.
 
I think I understand some of the posts above. The general gist of it seems to be that because some estate agents behaved badly in the past, it follows that you can now do anything you like to any estate agent and it's ethically acceptable.

An unemployed man broke into my house years ago and nicked my stereo. By the logic above, it's OK for me to find my nearest unemployed person and break into his house. And it will be morally OK. Where did I leave my balaclava?
 
I'm with mf1 and Liam on this one.

Gazumping was wrong. The fact that it happened doesn't make gazundering any less wrong.

There's nothing inherently wrong with taking advantage of an almost stagnant market, for example by making multiple low-ball offers on the principle that someone will need to take it. But agreeing to a deal and then reneging on the terms is as unfair to a seller as it was in previous years to a buyer.

If you have a magic way of knowing that the seller in question previously knowingly and deliberately partook in a gazumping transaction, you could convincingly argue that gazundering now is their karmic chickens coming home to roost. Otherwise, you're giving a specious justification of unethical behaviour.
 
foghorn said:
Nantastic - ignore the VIs - you might as well be asking turkeys what flavour stuffing they would like shoved up their This post will be deleted if not edited to remove bad language.
Click to expand...

Absolutely - if mf1 expresses an opinion that you don't like, you should do your best to discredit mf1 as a VI. S/he couldn't possibly hold opinions contrary to yours unless s/he was trying to manipulate the market.

Oh and befor you mention it, I'm a broker and therefore obviously part of this huge and dastardly club of VIs that are infiltrating the world wide web everywhere. Like mf1, I'm also incapable of expressing an opinion on ethics without it being tainted by self-interest and my desire to single-handedly re-start the property boom.
 
LDFerguson said:
Absolutely - if mf1 expresses an opinion that you don't like, you should do your best to discredit mf1 as a VI. S/he couldn't possibly hold opinions contrary to yours unless s/he was trying to manipulate the market.
Click to expand...
Well, obviously. mf1 doesn't even believe that all solicitors are irredeemably evil :eek:.

LDFerguson said:
Oh and befor you mention it, I'm a broker and therefore obviously part of this huge and dastardly club of VIs that are infiltrating the world wide web everywhere. Like mf1, I'm also incapable of expressing an opinion on ethics without it being tainted by self-interest and my desire to single-handedly re-start the property boom.
Click to expand...
I can't remember, are brokers evil, or just suspect?

I think that has more shades of grey and accordingly you can merely be sent for re-education.

Lesson one: It's fine, and probably ethically imperative, to treat everyone else badly if you're a buyer.

That's all. Just keep repeating that until you believe it.
 
Is 'gazundering' in the dictionary??? :)
Not making light of things - I always felt gazumping was the most awful practice (having lived in the US for 13 years where you made an offer, counter offered back and forth for a few days and then either agreed price or walked - it was all very civil!)
The only way I see reducing a price that is agreed is if the price is conditional upon a structural survey or mortgage approval or whatever.
 
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To the OP;
If you're asking if this is the best practice for you, then NO. The EA's will still work to the builders guide price, its only when a low-ball offer comes in and the builder realises that its better to cut his losses and take it, then a bargain can be got. The EA's aren't going to keep putting lower and lower offers untill a bottom is reached. I'm guessing this builder might have more houses for sale with either or both EA's, the EA's aren't going to jeoperdise future business but working in your interest, not the builders.
With your method, you will get a reduction, but not as much as if you had of put in a low (but realistic to the market) offer.
 
OP, the EA's know that you are dealing with both of them so if they are doing things right they have already agreed to split the fee and the final thing you are forgetting is that the vendor will agree to the sale price it wont simply be a backward auction.

Re gazumping and gazundering both are legal yet unethical. Gazumping is unethical but if any offer comes in the EA is legally obliged to put that to the vendor and it is then their call as it is their property. So while EA's have always gotten the stick for gazundering (shotting the messenger) it has been joe public who has actually sanctioned the practice just like it is joe public who is now engaging in the equally unethical gazundering. But it is far easier to say that rogue EA's have been screwing us all these years rather than face the reality that there are more than enough rogues in this country willing to screw over each other for a few extra grand.
 
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