crozz

hello everyone havent been on for a while just wondering if anybody else has had same bad luck has me.got visa feb 05 put house on market march 05 no viewings for 3-4 weeks gradually red price; by oct o5 red price by 15 grand has had to be in oz by feb 06 eventually got 3 viewings by same couple then a firm offer which we accepted 4 days later estate agent rung to tell us the couple had pulled out.by this time we were that peed off took house off the market and went for a month reccie trip in nov.got christmas out of the way spent about 4 grand doing the house up and 4 months later put house back on market 3 grand less than cheapest estate agents valuation and still only 3 viewings and no offers had visas over a year and were still here like to hear from anyone else in same position with house sale.cheers crozz.

Perthforme

Yes loads of people have house sale dramas , mine took 4-5 months last year . Have you been out to validate your visas ?

Wendy

Don't talk to me about selling the house What a pain it is these days.

We thought we'd got everything out of the way, then you get hit with a bill for chancel repair liability insurance You get that sorted then you get a letter asking for the planning permission for work done by the council 3 years before YOU buy the house


Proper fed up with it all. I will be so glad to get away from it, I think I'm never going to buy a house EVER again

chaval

We're having the same probs...had 2 veiwings today. One went ok...the others didnt even turn up. Just hope it sells sometime soon.

Best of luck

elfin

We have been trying to sell for over a year now, almost sold Dec but buyers could'nt sell theirs, SOLD Feb but their buyer pulled out, SOLD AGAIN May, due to exchange 19th of this month, packers booked for 22nd. For the past three weeks I have chased,pleaded,cajoled and coerced the Estate agent, solicitor, buyer to please pull their fingers out as the deadline was getting awfully close, only to be treated like a deranged woman who needs help, and guess what????? Friday they all start ringing to say they don't think the deadline can't be done........I don't want to say I told you so ....BUT I TOLD YOU SO, THREE ****** WEEKS AGO!!!!!!!!!!.
Rant over we went and got yesterday and were gonna cancel the removals tomorrow.
Elfin

skater

we've had ours on the market for six weeks, one viewing. Hubby flies over end of July and I will follow eight weeks later, with the kids. If we haven't had an offer by the end of August then we will lett it out looking to put it on after 4 months of the tenancy for a couple of months, and so it will go on until sold. We've sorted out two 'power's of attorney' already.
We were planning to rent in Aus for a year anyway.
Good luck with yours
Skater Sue

Dave - Jackie

Hi There

Had the same nightmare, got the visa last year (March 05) put the house up for sale June 05 thinking that it will go really quick! House still on the market with no bidders Jan 06 had to go across and validate our visas in the Jan 06 having reduced the house by quite a bit!

Still on the market when we came back changed agents thinking that it would do good but did not! Changed again and last week we have sold the house (fingers crossed) for a LOT less than what we put it up for but at least hopefully all going well we should be on our way soon!

Hope all goes well for you and you should know that you are not the only one in the boat even thought it feels like it sometimes!

Good Luck
Jackie

username 34

hate to tell all you with houses on the market what you already probably know but...

from now to Sept is the worst time to sell your house - people on holidays. people liking their own house now it looks good in the summer, people spending time with their families, people spending money on summer outings etc...

best time - Sept/Oct/Nov supposedly.

Hope all of you get it sorted - I feel your house pain! Our house (years ago) fell through on the DAY OF COMPLETION! coz they suddenly decided they couldnt afford it (WTF!!!) I almost hunted the buyers down and killed them!

elfin

It's all so wrong, our buyers solicitors said they had applied for searches so I rang the local authority and no such thing not even an appointment made for a private company (which I am told solitors use to undercut the LA), but the lovely woman at the LA gave me her name and number and said give this to the buyers solicitor and I will do it today for you. Fantastic I thought at last someone who cares. The estate agent rang the buyers solicitor and they said sorry we use a private company who make an appointment to visit the LA offices, do the searches write a report send it to us,we collate the information and pass it on to our client(the buyer), to which our estate agent said but you could just ring and do it by email....their answer!!!! Sorry we can't break with protocol ...WTF.............no they prefer to waste time so that they can justify the costs.
This is our lives they are messing with......I need to lie down before I combust.
Elfin

adenray

We put our house on the market the week before Christmas '05 (strange time of year I know but we thought we would test the market). The agents came around, typed up the details and the ad went on the internet 23rd December. Our first viewing was on Christmas Eve - great we thought! The viewing went well an hour later we had a call from the agent with an offer and for the next 4 hours the offer and counter offers were ping ponged until we all met a mutually acceptable figure. It was all going great guns, searches, surveys, etc.

We hadn't set a date to migrate and we were not in any particular hurry - end of school year would have been fine. However, our buyers wanted in as soon as possible. Their house had sold back in October and their buyers had been very patient waiting for our buyers to find somewhere.

Well, we thought we would let our buyers set a date and we said we would fall in with their plans. A date of Wednesday 1st March was set by our buyers and both their buyers and us agreed that this was an achieveable date and so the ball was sent rolling into action. Solicitors, estate agents, etc pulling out all the stops.

We started selling off and giving away furniture. Bags of toys, clothes and bric-a-brac amongst other stuff went off to the charity shops. Family and friends took their pickings and we were left with the core of items we wanted to take with us to Oz. We had quotes from removal companies and told them our deadlines.

The weeks and days started to pass quickly. We had our updates from solicitors and estate agents and all was running smoothly, the date was still achieveable. Our buyers came around with their parents to measure up for furniture, curtains, etc. We talked though the dates again with our buyers and asked for their assurances. They were dead keen and were giving off all the right signals. The female of the family phoned to say that their mortgage offer had came through and she wanted our assurance that we would be out of the house and contracts to complete on 1st March as agreed. We agreed as planned. We booked the international shippers to come and pack everything up on 27th and 28th February, we booked and paid for our tickets. Flying out on 4th March and we would stay with family for two nights, everything great.

By now we are into mid Feb. Our agents phoned to say they couldn't get a reply from our buyer either on their house phone or her mobile to set the date for exchange. Everything was ready. Message after message was left. Our agents called their agents and solicitors. Mystery! This set alarm bells ringing and we asked the agent to follow it up.

Towards the end of the week we got a call from our buyer to ask what the problem was. We told her that our solciitor and agent were trying to set a date for exchange of contracts. All she said was that she had been away on business, that she still wanted the house, for us NOT to put the house back on the market and she gave us her assurance that everything was still fine.

Another week passed, still no exchange and our agents said that it was 'touch and go' for a completion on 1st March. We asked them to call our buyers and their solicitors to find out what was happening.

Our agents called us and told us they couldn't get through to the buyer again. They said that our buyers solcitor hadn't received confirmation of instruction to proceed. Our solicitor then called their solicitor to find out what was happening and the same comment was made.

2 more days passed - this brought us to 24th February and we still hadn't exchanged. Everyone was fraught! We told our agent to get onto our buyers and to give them an ultimatum that if we hadn't heard from them by 12 noon then we would be putting the house back on the market. Our agent phoned us at 1pm and told us that she still wanted the house and was going into her solcitor that afternoon to sign the papers.

Our shippers arrived on Monday, 27th February and started to wrap and pack our items. Our agent phoned us at 3pm to say that our buyers hadn't been able to get into the solicitor on Friday and were going in at 4pm. Exchange was imminent and completion would still go through on Wednesday, 1st March as planned. Phew we thought.

The remainder of our goods were wrapped and packed and we waved goodbye to the container late Tuesday, 28th February and we packed ourselves off to my brother. The agent phoned us on the mobile at 5pm to say that the solicitors hadn't heard from our buyers. They had waited all day and hadn't been able to get hold of them. You can imagine how we felt.

Wednesday, 1st March came. Our solcitor called us to tell us that the buyers solicitor had called him to say that our buyers had changed their mind and decided not to proceed.

What could we do? Our house was completely empty. Letters had been sent to utilities, doctors, dentists, banks, schools, etc. You name it and the whole world new we were migrating. We couldn't change anything and still had to leave. So for the next 2 days we were frantically running around, setting up Power of Attorney with our solicitor. We had another estate agent around and a couple of property letting agents; all of whom said they wouldn't have a propblem wither selling or letting the house.

We have now been here in Australia for 3 months. The house has been sold subject to contract twice but these new sets of buyers have either lost their buyer or haven't been able to raise the mortgage. ITs left us with a beautiful house which has been on and off the market more times than I've had hot dinners in the last few months and we are now beginning to think that it is an omen not to have sold.

However, the good news is that we are once again under offer. Surveys and searches have been done and our POTENTIAL buyer has just had his mortgage offer today! It appears that exchange will either take place next week or early the following week. All we can do now is just wait.

I did contact the first buyer by email to say how bitterly disappointed we were that they didn't have the b***s to tell us earlier. She didn't reply. We have since learned that she had done this several times before and had in fact had three houses in mind to buy and took all three of us to the wire before pulling out on all three. Needless to say she has since lost her buyer who finally ran out of patience!

Phew!

hedgehog

I bet you're glad you got that off your chest !!!! I blame the EA, they don't vet any one coming round, we have had a few time wasters and the EA who sent them said yes we know they are not serious buyers WTF. I spend all night cleaning and putting stuff away. take half a day off work and you say YOU KNOW they are going to waste my time !!!!!!! Good luck to you for having the courage and strength LOL, to write this post and good luck for an early sale for you.

onepearlyb

We've had ours on the market for about 3 months. The first people who came to see it 3 days after it was put up for sale, wanted tobuy it and put offer in. We accepted. Then they phoned to say they'd gone and found another place "just like ours but cheaper"!!! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Then the next two that came along to view it, didn't even have their houses on the market, so were "just having a look".
There's now SIX houses up for sale all within 50 yards of each other on our street and a shed lot more up for sale around the area.
What's happening with house sales just now. It's like nothing's happening/moving!!
We've only just applied but we just want shot of the house asap so it's one less thing to worry about and the sooner the better.
*pearly*

Tony & Tina

Hi all,
You're not alone, we've had ours on the market for 9 weeks, not even a sniff of interest. It's been reduced twice, 5K each time, EA assures us it will sell and that the housing market is picking up, albeit slowly.
If we fail to sell, then it looks like we'll have to rent it out, just to pay the mortgage. Was hoping to use collateral for a property in Oz with minimal mortgage.
Have even thought about letting it go at a loss to www.nationalhomebuyers.co.uk they say they are always on the look out for properties. Anyone else thinking of going down this avenue?


Good luck to all those hoping for a quick sale.

furkew

Hi T & T. I don't know them personally being on the other side on the channel. but they will happily buy your property for peanuts, and then resell it. If you do a search you will find a few threads about them. Not good in general. Bear with it, and take a bit less, but not a kick in the nuts.

Paul.

Wendy

Yep, good advice.

We looked into using them at our last house and they wanted £500 to do a survey and said they may pay up to 85% of the market value. But that it wasn't a guarantee that they would buy it and that the £500 was not refundable if they didn't.

Con merchants, don't even think about it