Inconvenient Annoyances

No. This literally is a case where a couple put an offer on a house 2 doors down. It’s a local, family owned estate agents who don’t canvass the streets. The couple wanted to be in this area and they saw we had been on the market a few months prior and they asked if we would be relisting as they had a buyer who missed out on the other house because they didn’t have a buyer and now their house was sold. Literally, they had a couple wanting to buy a house on my road and they wanted a viewing ASAP. This wasn’t a scam where they didn’t actually have somebody (we signed NO agreement with the estate agent prior to us having a viewing). It was sold in less than a week to that couple. There were two viewings days apart, one done by the estate agents and one done by us. They brought a buyer to our doorstep after having worked with this buyer, which is why I say they worked for the buyer **in this one off instance** (yes they worked for themselves as if they didn’t put in effort, they might not have made any sale to this couple, but they did more for the buyer than us in this particular situation). 


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Ah right. Seller always pays. Seller chooses which EA to use and can use an EA with lower fees. I would have been tempted to put my own homemade For Sign up and collect that buyer fee free. I've done that before.

It was the same if the EA had a letting section too, landlord always paid even if the tenant came in to look for a property because the landlord can choose the Letting Agent to use. Then it all went weird and LAs found they could collect fees from landlords and the tenants, and invent all new types of fees for them to keep too, but now the new law will be returning it to what it should be.

Ah right. Seller always pays. Seller choses which EA to use and can use a cheaper EA. I would have been tempted to put my own homemade For Sign up and collect that buyer fee free. I've done that before.

It was the same if the EA have a letting agent section too, landlord always paid even if the teanant came in to look for a property becasue landlord can choose the Letting Agent to use. Then it all went weird and LAs were collecting from from landlords and tenants, and now the new law will be returning it to what it should be.

Yep that’s why I was saying that we were paying despite then not really working for us on this rare occasion. To be honest, we did think about trying to contact the sellers ourselves but then we weren’t sure if there were any legal claims the estate agent could use against us and we really didn’t feel like researching deeply on the matter. We figured we’d just try to negotiate on the sellers fee but they weren’t having it (just told us they’d give us a few hundred off fees for our new house if we bought through them). Honestly, it was the easiest sale we’ve had and just wasn’t worth the extra effort to cut them out. It was annoying for sure, but we’ve got too much on our plate already so just couldn’t be bothered to resist more.

What I don’t like about sellers being the person to choose the EA as a buyer is that I’m stuck potentially helping to give a shitty EA commission on a sale of a house If the one I want is listed with them. That’s the situation we’re in now. The one we really like is listed with a bigger name EA and the same EA that screwed us with our flat by closing one of our disputes cases against a past tenant by mistake (to make a long story short) and the guy that showed us around yesterday really was no help at all and was the stereotype of a sleezy EA but our hands are tied if we want the house...


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Yep that’s why I was saying that we were paying despite then not really working for us on this rare occasion. To be honest, we did think about trying to contact the sellers ourselves but then we weren’t sure if there were any legal claims the estate agent could use against us and we really didn’t feel like researching deeply on the matter.

You hadn't signed up to that EA to find you a buyer, so that would be fine. Deciding to put up your own For Sale sign is OK too, or an add in the paper,  and if that meant you got that buyer, good for you.

What I don’t like about sellers being the person to choose the EA as a buyer is that I’m stuck potentially helping to give a shitty EA commission on a sale of a house If the one I want is listed with them.

They are in business and seller pays. It could be they went with that EA as they had cheaper fees. Either blanket  drop the area with your own "looking to buy" and don't  contact the Estate Agent; or still don't contact the EA, knock on the door of the house you might like and say you are interested but haven't contacted their EA (they might not have long left on their contract with that EA).

In regards to your edit, yes they do try to flog their own services (in this case, we have a financial advisor and he’s already sorted out our offer in principle for a mortgage and all that good stuff, so we just shut down those questions as well as the questions about “do you have a property to sell”. Definitely good to mention to those who haven’t been through the process.

Don't forget too that that their MA then knows the buyers finaces and the EA then knows how high you could go in price.

Never had a situation in either of our purchases where they’ve called a solicitor to ask about the how the sale is going unprompted by us, but that’s a good thing to look out for.

Most don't, unless they ask their solicitor for a full breakdown of their bill.

You hadn't signed up to that EA to find you a buyer, so that would be fine. Deciding to put up your own For Sale sign is OK too, or an add in the paper,  and if that meant you got that buyer, good for you.

They are in business and seller pays. It could be they went with that EA as they had cheaper fees. Either blanket  drop the area with your own "looking to buy" and don't  contact the Estate Agent; or still don't contact the EA, knock on the door of the house you might like and say you are interested but haven't contacted their EA (they might not have long left on their contract with that EA).

Again, we preferred the guaranteed buyer and couldn’t be bothered to take any risks. This was an annoyance because I don’t feel they deserve the % they’re asking for but we honestly weren’t bothered enough to circumvent it.

Yep. Well aware the seller always pays lol (wouldn’t ever argue that). Again, couldn’t be bothered to put in the effort to go around the EA. As annoying as it is, we’ve got way too much on our plates to go around the EA. I don’t want to go through these particularly bad EA, but I’m not so riled that I’ll go around them. As mentioned, We’ve already seen the house through them so they they’ve technically introduced us so there’d be a fee for the buyer from them regardless.

If we didn’t have massively busy lives as is, i would definitely look to cut out the EA when possible, but I subscribe to picking my battles and I honestly just don’t have the time to deal with the stress and leg work of all that myself.


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Don't forget too that that their MA then knows the buyers finaces and the EA then knows how high you could go in price.

Most don't, unless they ask their solicitor for a full breakdown of their bill.

Yeah it’s another reason we avoid their MA. I prefer our financial advisor who doesn’t charge us for that particular work and I know will work to get us the best rates he can. He’s honestly been great for the last few years we’ve used him.

Yeah we always get full breakdowns


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Our shower has been getting progressively worse over the last month. It started with 30 seconds of cold water a minute or two after turning on the shower. Then alternated hot and cold every couple minutes. And now, just cold, so no shower for me because I already have a pulled muscle in my back and that would just make it much worse. Hopefully it's getting fixed today!

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Our shower has been getting progressively worse over the last month. It started with 30 seconds of cold water a minute or two after turning on the shower. Then alternated hot and cold every couple minutes. And now, just cold, so no shower for me because I already have a pulled muscle in my back and that would just make it much worse. Hopefully it's getting fixed today!

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Oh man! I remember we had a boiler issue that was causing this same type of thing and it drove me up a wall!!! My husband takes very quick showers first thing in the morning so he'd get hot water and by the time I took showers it was AWFUL and freezing and at first he'd do the "I don't know what you're doing to make it do that..." thing......until it started happening to him lol.

Assuming your landlord is aware and fixing it as you mentioned it getting fixed today. Fingers crossed!!

Oh man! I remember we had a boiler issue that was causing this same type of thing and it drove me up a wall!!! My husband takes very quick showers first thing in the morning so he'd get hot water and by the time I took showers it was AWFUL and freezing and at first he'd do the "I don't know what you're doing to make it do that..." thing......until it started happening to him lol.

Assuming your landlord is aware and fixing it as you mentioned it getting fixed today. Fingers crossed!!

Yes, and they're fixing another issue she's had problems with for *years*. They installed the pipes wrong (they didn't weld them) so there's been a slow leak that finally came to the surface just before we moved in. Apparently it's the compressor that broke in the boiler, vs just not heating water, so we've had the same experience. Either way it's been an awful dance to get clean for the last week

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UGH nightmare!! I really hope it all gets sorted quickly today!

This is inconvenient

This is inconvenient

At least he won't be able to reproduce! His nuts = crushed to oblivion

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This is inconvenient

Well.... They have to discourage that somehow.

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Campervan got egged!  Who even does this, anymore?!

Campervan got egged!  Who even does this, anymore?!

Definitely not eggshellent...

Seriously though, in agreement with you about who even does that?!


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