Length of time house can stay on a website

H

house seller

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Hi

I am currently trying to sell my house but with no luck:(

There is a house on the same road that has been up on another website for months and months as "sale agreed". Problem is the house is a good bit cheaper than mine but it its more run down.

I have rang this estate agents enquiring when the house will be taken down off their site (as it obviously looks very bad to potential buyers of our house) but they tell me they cant say how much longer it will be up there (and she basically told me to p*ss off!)

Is there any length of time that a house can be up on an agents website or any regulatory authority that monitors this sort of thing??

I know its fair enough that the house is still not officially sold (or so they say) but could the whole process of selling it really be taking this long?? (must be about 6 months now since I first saw it)

Anyone any advice on what I could do:confused: ?
 
Its been on the market for 3 months now. Might lower price in another few months.

Was just wondering if anyone had any advice regarding the neighbouring property?
 
To be honest I dont see how the other house would affect yours. Surely there is enough stock locally advertised to show that yours is not 'overpriced'.
 
I think it's interesting that this topic is similar to many in the US in recent months, where neighbours begin to blame other neighbours who lower their price for "devaluing their property".
 
well, I got my estate agent to look into the neighbouring property which is being advertised as "sale agreed" for 220. As I suspected the house has definately been sold and has been sold for about a year at 220! Obviously prices have gone up in a year and seeing as the house was sold a year ago, isnt it is being falsely advertised at last years lower price?
My problem (hmmm) is not with the neighbours who rightly sold their house at last years price - but instead with the estate agent who still have the property up on their site at last years price! If anyone who is interested in buying my house sees this other house as " sale agreed" at 220 (and this is very likely as it is in a small town) they are going to think that it is currently sale agreed and that my house is overpriced. (And I know that my house isnt overpriced as we went with the lower of 3 evaluations on it.)
My estate agent asked the other estate agent to take down the neighbouring house from the site, and they said they would - but they still havent 2 weeks later!
Do I have any legal rights? Any (relevant) advice on what I can do? I'm really at the end of my tether here
thanks a lot
 
Cant your EA not just tell potential purchasers what you have told us. Most people know that when a house is on website the price thats up isnt actually the price it goes for. In fact most of the houses we viewed went up by about 50k from the price that was on the site. I know you said that you live in a small town but i still think peole would have the cop on to know whats going on.

thats just my view!!!!!!

Or else what you could do is if you know the vendor of the other house, ask them would they ask their EA to take it off the website.
 
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Did it occur to you, houseseller, that the houses might not have appreciated in value and that the EA is having difficulty selling the neighbouring property? Unpleasant though it is, he is next likely to drop the price in order to get a sale.
 
well, I got my estate agent to look into the neighbouring property which is being advertised as "sale agreed" for 220. As I suspected the house has definately been sold and has been sold for about a year at 220! Obviously prices have gone up in a year and seeing as the house was sold a year ago, isnt it is being falsely advertised at last years lower price?
My problem (hmmm) is not with the neighbours who rightly sold their house at last years price - but instead with the estate agent who still have the property up on their site at last years price! If anyone who is interested in buying my house sees this other house as " sale agreed" at 220 (and this is very likely as it is in a small town) they are going to think that it is currently sale agreed and that my house is overpriced. (And I know that my house isnt overpriced as we went with the lower of 3 evaluations on it.)
My estate agent asked the other estate agent to take down the neighbouring house from the site, and they said they would - but they still havent 2 weeks later!
Do I have any legal rights? Any (relevant) advice on what I can do? I'm really at the end of my tether here
thanks a lot

I sympathise with your frustration with the sale agreed sign. I would keep hounding your EA to get the other EA to take it down. IMO EA use these sale agreed signs as an advertising for their own business. I'm also surprised the person who bought the house has not asked for it's removal.
 
Have the new owners actually moved in? If so perhaps you could ask them to take down the sign. The house may still only be sale agreed with no final payment made yet. In this case the estate agent is right to keep the sign up.
 
I am not sure of the rights and wrongs of leaving the sign up but this thread is simply a sign of a housing market starting to change. There are to many second hand houses for sale at the minute and if people want to sell then prices will have to drop. Simple as...
 
Luttrell AL and Moesha - you are the only people who actually read all my mails, understood the issue and replied with relevant advice on the question I was asking!!! Thank you for your responses!
 
I understood your post perfectly well. And I presumed that you are blaming this cheaper house which is advertised on the website for your own unsuccesful attempt at selling your property. I told you that (in my opinion and to the best of my knowledege) there is nothing you an do about it, and that I doubt very much whether this website has anything to do with your property not selling. Far more likely is that the asking price you are seeking is in all likelihood excessive/unrealisitic, otherwise I think it is pretty safe bet to assume your property would have been sold by now.

You can of course harrass the EA whose site the other house is on. But, I fear that this may not do any good as there is a fair chance that they will categorise you as a crank and it may even provoke them into keeping it even longer on their site.
 
I completely read and understood your post. What I don't understand is the new owner allowing the sign to stay. That's why I asked if it was 'sale agreed' or 'sold'. Sale agreed goes on a house as soon as an offer is accepted. Sold does not go on until contracts are signed and money paid over. If your house went sale agreed tomorrow, you would not want the sign taken down until the sale was definite.

In any event, if the owner of the property has no objection to the sign and his property on the website, then you haven't a leg to stand on!
 
I completely read and understood your post. What I don't understand is the new owner allowing the sign to stay. That's why I asked if it was 'sale agreed' or 'sold'. Sale agreed goes on a house as soon as an offer is accepted. Sold does not go on until contracts are signed and money paid over. If your house went sale agreed tomorrow, you would not want the sign taken down until the sale was definite.

In any event, if the owner of the property has no objection to the sign and his property on the website, then you haven't a leg to stand on!

Lightweight is quite right here. There have been instances of houses going sale agreed and then coming back on the market for whatever reason. IN this situation, it makes sense to keep the sign up until it is actually sold (ie contracts signed and money paid over) at which point I am sure the new owners would take the sign down pretty quickly
 
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