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Is it OK to Take Your Property Off the Market?

  • 2 years ago
a-house-for-sale-sign-outside-a-home

You put your property on the market with every expectation of finding a buyer within a reasonable timeframe – a couple of months, maybe – but here you are, four or five months later, still…on the market.

What do you do? Do you stay hopeful? Do you race around tidying frantically every few days just in case this latest viewing is The One? Or do you beat a tactical retreat and remove your listing? 

It may be the case that your circumstances have changed and so selling up and moving is no longer necessary or even a viable option. Whatever your reasons, you need to discuss your plans with your agent as while you as owners are free to sell or not sell, there may be fees involved.

If you want to pull out of selling

If you’ve been on the market and haven’t found a buyer, then you can usually pull out without incurring fees. You may have to wait for a pre-determined amount of time (usually 12 weeks) before taking your place off the market without a charge.

In some cases, your agreement might stipulate that you pay some kind of charge to come off the books, so always double check when you sign on with an agent.

If your estate agent has found you a buyer and you then decide not to proceed for any reason, you may incur a marketing and advertising fee because the agent found you a potential buyer. 

If you want to change to another estate agent

You might feel that your current agent isn’t to your satisfaction and want to engage a different one. Rather than jumping ship straight away, however, it might be better to talk to your current agent to see if anything can be done to improve things, as switching agents might prove to be costly.

To sum up

  • Check over your contract to see when (or if) you can take your property off the market without incurring any charges
  • Find out what you may have to pay if you decide to switch estate agents
  • Sometimes, if you’ve been on the market a while with no luck, or if you’ve come to the end of the agreed term with your agent, you may escape any charges

If you’ve found a buyer by yourself

Sometimes you may find a buyer by yourself, but you may still need to pay your estate agent some commission. Many estates agent contracts state that you’ll have to pay fees if the agent introduces a ‘purchaser who is ready, willing and able to complete the transaction’. 

Under these circumstances, your agent could ask for fees because they claim to have found another potential buyer who was just as keen as the buyer you found. They can also claim this if they find a potential buyer and you take the property off the market.

These fees, however, may be limited to some of the advertising and marketing fees rather than a full commission, especially if you can demonstrate that your agent wasn’t marketing your property in a satisfactory way.

Always read the small print

Of course, depending on your contract, you might not have to pay anything. It’s vital that you examine your contract before signing it so that you know what to expect should your plans change.

 

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