Neighbors from hell, selling flat, crappy Estate Agent

 

I feel like something's got to give or just a bit of luck is coming our way (maybe karma is preparing us for a win in the lottery).

The Neighbors:
We have decided to put the flat up for sale even though it's the worst possible moment, what with the market and the unruly neighbors currently living in the flat next to us, which is owned by the council. Now I don't mean to discriminate/judge, but if you can think of the worst possible public housing tenants you can ever imagine, that's them plus they smoke enough weed that even with our windows closed, it still manages to permeate into our home and the other homes in the apartment block. We've tried reporting all this to the authorities but they just add our reports to "their case" but really nothing has or will be done about this until someone is physically harmed. In addition to them, we've got Mr and Mrs Knob living above us who make too much noise in the middle of the night (think a hammer repeated banging on the wall kind of noise) and it's so loud it's as if they're in the same room as us! Then the neighborhood kids, which fairplay to some of them, kids will be kids but do they have to do it right in front of our lounge window? There is a whole field (the size of a soccer football field) in front of our building and where do they choose to play ball, right in front of our G-D window, which has been struck by their ball several times. Of course one would think their own parents would tell them to move and apolagize to us, but nope, they are even the ones playing catch with them! When you tell the kids to stop playing because they hit our window, all you get is cheeky answers like, "you've got double glazing anyway" "it's just a rugby football, it's flat" etc. Also, Knob Junior is allowed to play ball in their *bleep*ing apartment. We've been working hard to keep the corridors clean in case a viewer comes around, and after we mopped the communal corridor, another neighbor had the gall to comment that there should be a Wet Floor sign (even though the paid cleaners never do leave a sign when they're around) right before she takes a drag of her cigarette. Did I forget to mention that she's pregnant and regularly steals the shopping trolleys from the local Asda and has now, by our last count 6 stacked together in the back garden?

Crappy Estate Agent:
Sorry, that was my roundabout way of saying that we have had it. We decided to put the flat in the market, take the money and run. We wanted to move anyway to better job markets for me and better social lives for the both of us.

Now I will say this, in our excitement to do so, we didn't do as much research as we should have but we figured this national estate agent (2 words, first begins with Y and second word begins with M) was a good pick. We're both new at this so we were quite naive. Anyway, not only was the agent fee high (2.4%) but when we refused to go as low as he said for the asking price, he basically threw his hands up and said you can't blame the "premium marketing" or him if we don't get offers. So this "premium marketing" bs is just that really. It's been 2 weeks and our property has barely gone online, incomplete and we've had to chase him every step of the way for every piece of service that they've offered and we've paid for. Of course every time we tried to reach him, it's every excuse in the book: he's got a doctor's appointment, he's in a meeting, he went on VACATION! Meanwhile, no one is handling our property. When we told him after he was back from his vacation that no one has viewed the place he blamed the asking price! WTF!!!! We're only asking for 5k above what he wants.

By the way, anybody have experience, advice regarding property buyers/investors? We're thinking it might be easier going that route.

Meanwhile our finances are dwindling quickly and everywhere we look, someone is either driving us crazy or scamming us. We're trying very hard to be positive but it is trying. One week I'm depressed and when I feel better the next week, it's my wife down in the dumps. We're trying hard not to let this affect our relationship. Anyway, just wanted to unload some of that. Someone please pray for us lol.

Can you fire your estate agent?

Sorry you're dealing with this. It would drive me 'round the bend.

It sounds crazy but we're giving him another week. We're trying to figure out if we're entitled to pay anything if we do so.

Sorry to hear about your woes. I can certianly comiserate on the crappy neighbour situation. We have a pothead that lives on the other side of the hall from us and he recently got his flat raided by the police (rammed down their door on a Sunday last month) and was found to have over 100 pot plants growing in his lounge. No wonder it reeked in the hall 24-7 for the past few months & I had been complaining to the building management for months and even mentioned it to the police that someone called to complain about the people that live next to us! Yeah so we are supposed to live in a 'secure' building but we have a pot grower and a dealer living on both sides of us and I have a 2 year old!

So I can completely understand what you're dealing with. Thankfully we live on the 6th floor and no one plays on our balcony but us )

Hope you're able to get things sorted soon.

Regarding making a complaint against an estate agent, more information here:

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/HomeAndCommunity/BuyingAndSellingYourHome/SellingYourHome/DG_171890

Sounds like a rubbish situation and I hope it works out  :)OK!

Sorry to hear about your woes. I can certianly comiserate on the crappy neighbour situation. We have a pothead that lives on the other side of the hall from us and he recently got his flat raided by the police (rammed down their door on a Sunday last month) and was found to have over 100 pot plants growing in his lounge. No wonder it reeked in the hall 24-7 for the past few months & I had been complaining to the building management for months and even mentioned it to the police that someone called to complain about the people that live next to us! Yeah so we are supposed to live in a 'secure' building but we have a pot grower and a dealer living on both sides of us and I have a 2 year old!

So I can completely understand what you're dealing with. Thankfully we live on the 6th floor and no one plays on our balcony but us )

Hope you're able to get things sorted soon.

Well we just found out from the "Trust" that owns the pothead's flat that since canibis smoking can not be measured, they can't do anything about it. Why they didn't just tell us this from the beginning instead of making us believe that they will do something about it is such BS. Almost 10 months we've been reporting this to them! Also, the PC in charge of dealing with these kinds of things basically said a lot of people smoke pot. I never really believed they would get do anything but I had hoped. Now we're just washing our hands of it. Also, I forgot to mention that my partner witnessed this pothead's big dog attack a neighbor's smaller dog and pothead wasn't even home. My partner helped the neighbor into safety. Now she's a witness and pothead is being tried in Crown Court in the near future. I think pothead finally figured out the she's a witness and I'm pretty sure he's responsible for the dog s*@t by our window.

I'm telling you guys, our life right now is a horror story. We just want to move.

In the meantime, our flat is finally being advertised as promised. No viewings yet though. If we can't sell, we're thinking of letting the place. Anyone know of good letting agents or where we can start researching about this? I'm preparing myself for another battle.

Now she's a witness and pothead is being tried in Crown Court in the near future.

Your profile says your in NYC but I think you are actually in the UK.

Sorry about your situation but its quite common here. Its pretty lawless and the older construction has no noise insulation. Try and go for a concrete and steel building or a townhouse. You can't buy a handgun but surprsingly you can buy shotguns.

Yes, but only if you can prove that you have a legitimate reason to have a shotgun.  I don't think 'my neighbors are annoying' will satisfy the police.

Keep it on topic please.

I have just relocated for the third time in the UK, and it is/was my third "round" of using the estate agents. Been here 3.5 years.  This time I went with a very large (one of the biggest) estate agents in the country.   The pros, they could get me into viewings for flats very quickly, perhaps faster than the little guy, which was surprising, and a little counter intuitive.  They also naturally had a wider selection of flats to look at.  If my favourite place was taken over night, there were several more on the backburner to put in offers on.  The cons, there were loads of mistakes on the contracts, with the keys, mistakes in partking availability, transfering of funds, etc.   My opinion is to use the agents for the house/flat hunting, but be very careful when it comes to the details.  The owner of the house ended up just calling me directly and decided to cut out the middle man. He is Swedish and was getting very frustrated at the lack of follow through on the agent company's behalf.  As for long term property management (i.e., collecting monthly rent, maintainence, etc) , we are dropping the company and working on a deal together. 

I hope this helps.

So an update. About a month after my initial post we got 2 offers at the same time! However, the buyer we choose backed out during the conveyancing stage  We got a couple more viewings and each one made offers, that we didn't like but the buyer we didn't choose came back into the picture and made anpther offer and we've accepted. We're just beginning the conveyancing now... wish us luck.

By the by, does anyone know the differences with the real estate procedures/transactions (completing/closing) between the US and UK? I mean, buyers in the UK can back out up until the key is handed over, right?

I don't have any experience with housing over there, but I do wish you all the luck in the world that you can unload your flat quickly and get out of that situation.

So an update. About a month after my initial post we got 2 offers at the same time! However, the buyer we choose backed out during the conveyancing stage  We got a couple more viewings and each one made offers, that we didn't like but the buyer we didn't choose came back into the picture and made anpther offer and we've accepted. We're just beginning the conveyancing now... wish us luck.

By the by, does anyone know the differences with the real estate procedures/transactions (completing/closing) between the US and UK? I mean, buyers in the UK can back out up until the key is handed over, right?

I think it depends on whether you're in Scotland or England (or Wales, etc.).  I believe in Scotland the contract is binding once it is signed (not just an offer).  England, however I believe have open cancelation clauses...

Don't quote me on it but I would look into it--there's quite a lot of info online.

Good luck with the sale.
 

Update...

We're still in the conveyancing stage but hopefully it's only a couple of weeks until we've completed! I'm so nervous, anything can happen before contracts are exchanged.

Also, The Knob upstairs is getting worse and actually making noise (stomping, shouting at tv like an idiot) on purpose. We haven't complained to their landlord because we just want this sale to go smoothly, and the way things have been handled by the very people who are supposed to help good people like us, I don't think the landlord will even lift a finger. We just laugh at him now when he makes noise. Also, he's so stupid. By making all that noise when they're at it only announces to the world that they only have sex every 2 months! and that he's a grown man, a father, who acts like a 12 year old girl during Dancing on Ice, Strictly Come Dancing and X Factor.

The kid is still playing ball inside and they all still play that video game where you jump around/run so it feels like the ceiling is about to cave in on us! But the kid doesn't know any better. We just feel sorry for The Knob and his little life. Ugh, I used to dream about bludgeoning him or his car with a blunt object but now I don't even care enough to want to do that. I'll let him win this battle but my partner and I are moving on to a better life. He'll be stuck there with his knob stepson and children he sees on weekends and his waste-of-space girlfriend. It's not even his flat, it's hers.

The Potsmokers are harmless in the end. To be honest they're quite civil towards us, although he probably realizes that he shouldn't make our life hell purposely being that he's about to go to court. That's another thing, it's supposed to be sometime this month! He's also gotten another mean looking pup - they're still walking around untethered.

I hate making these long posts just complaining and moaning because I'm not a complainer, but all this is true and happening to us. It's not even half of itl Everything in my life atm is a battle.