# Eastate agent wants to see AIP and proof of funds before offer



## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

My wife and I are looking at buying a house and after many months of searching we have finally seen a house we both like. I contacted the estate agent yesterday and was told that they won't forward the offer until they have verified ID, seen the AIP and a deposit/proof of funds.

I understand that the vendor can select this option when receiving offers, that they only want serious buyers and people that have sufficient funds but I'm reluctant to go into the estate agent and show my AIP that is more than the property we wish to buy. I told the estate agent that I can bring in all the required information except the AIP, for that they can contact the mortgage broker to confirm that we have an AIP approved that is sufficient to purchase the property, I was then told that the estate agent does not deal with 3rd parties.

Just wondering if anyone else had had to deal with this ****e? 

New AIP with a lower figure will be produced to the estate agent to satisfy their requirement. 

I have dealt with other estate agents and have placed offers and was never asked for any AIP/deposit/ID. Only once the offer was accepted would I have had to provide all the information.


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## richtung (Apr 14, 2008)

I've never encountered this before but have read about it - my chief suspicion is that they are pushing you toward using their own in-house mortgage advisor - i believe the salesperson can earn a fair bit of commission for sending clients to the mortgage advisor.

I wasnt aware of it being policy that the EA must screen all potential clients before forwarding offers - I do believe by law that the EA must forward all offers?

You can always say that the AIP is private and confidential and is an agreement between you and the mortgage provider only and would be a massive conflict of interest the EA was to see it.

Hope this helps

Rich


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## adlem (Jul 6, 2008)

The EA is purely trying to see how much extra they can squeeze from you above asking price. Stick to your guns


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## Darlofan (Nov 24, 2010)

As Richtung said stick to your guns. There is only 1 reason they want to see it.


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## richtung (Apr 14, 2008)

Just read a good way to counter this - you could agree to show the AIP AFTER the offer has been accepted?

Rich


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## Alfieharley1 (Jun 8, 2014)

I'm with these guys -

I'm the sort of person says the following - 
"look I will offer this. I understand why you want to see my AIP however this is my max offer take it or leave it.

Thank you very glad"


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## Luke M (Jul 1, 2013)

When I made an offer on my house the estate agent came back and said it was accepted. I said great and in the spirit of the moment said "go stick a sold board on it then" they said "no we don't do that until we see the aip and proof of funds"
My reply was are you taking the "P"!? Get it done!
Sold board went on the next morning.


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## m4rkymark (Aug 17, 2014)

If the people are still in the house go and speak to them directly.


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## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

I think it's what EA should have done in the past but have never bothered.

It's a pile of BS anyway, years ago an elderly couple were buying my flat and day before exchange pulled out as their investments were not worth as much as they thought, seriously?!. Cost me a good few grand in surveyors fees, mortgage reservation fees etc on my aborted purchase


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## ffrs1444 (Jun 7, 2008)

I had to when buying my place before even viewing was to show my mortgage in principal cause they get ****ed of with people just browsing and wasting people's time


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## PaulaJayne (Feb 17, 2012)

m4rkymark said:


> If the people are still in the house go and speak to them directly.


^^^^^^^

This


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## shane_ctr (Dec 17, 2006)

Owning an estate agency I've never heard of asking for an AIP before making the offer, I would agree with others and tell them once accepted we will bring in the AIP, we get a lot of people who moan about producing the AIP after offer excepted, we will only put a property SSTC once we have had all the information.

You could go direct to the people and let them know, but be carful if you cut the estate agent out and make an offer and the offer is accepted the sellers will still incur commission. charges.


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## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

Many thanks for the responses everyone. 

@Richtung I read the same thing about mentioning to the EA that you can provide all the necessary documentation after the offer is accepted but this agent mentioned that they would not forward the offer to the vendor unless they had this information first. I actually made an offer on the house on Tuesday and was told to provide documentation as the vendor has requested that this is provided first before any offers are put through. What I read is that it's the EA that asks the vendor if they want this option and most probably a vendor would think this might sound like a good idea. It's likely that the EA actually pushes this as a good thing to the vendor.

The big problem I have is that I thought that by law the EA has to pass any offers to the vendor, no matter what the offer is. I just can't seem to find that this is an actual law, and from what I read if the vendor agreed to the option that offers will only be put forward once funds have been checked. 
I spoke to the EA this morning and I asked if the offer I made on Tuesday has been put forward to the vendor and was told no they are still waiting for me to provide proof of funds/AIP. 
So the EA has already stalled us for 2 days.

@m4rkymark The vendors have moved, the house is unoccupied. I've read about people knocking on the door to speak to vendor and explaining that the EA is stalling, or posting a letter to the vendor with the same explanation. We might still consider this.

I spoke to two colleagues today that are in the process of buying a house and they both said that they have never been asked for AIP/funds, only once the offer is accepted do they need to provide this information, which sounds like a logical process to me.

I never liked the idea of going into the EA with my AIP, laying all my cards on the table, but we have a really helpful mortgage adviser that printed a new AIP with a lower amount today which I provided to the EA and as some of you mentioned, once I was there they were really pushing hard to use their services which I declined. 

Maybe I should have insisted that the AIP would be shown after the offer was accepted but with the agent saying that they won't forward any offer to the vendor without this I thought it might be best to play with their rules.


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## shane_ctr (Dec 17, 2006)

Agents are required by law to put your offer to the vendor in writing within twenty four hours unless the vendor has instructed the agent not to contact him about offers below a certain level. 

I know of many agents who do not do this.


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## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

MDC250 said:


> I think it's what EA should have done in the past but have never bothered.
> 
> It's a pile of BS anyway, years ago an elderly couple were buying my flat and day before exchange pulled out as their investments were not worth as much as they thought, seriously?!. Cost me a good few grand in surveyors fees, mortgage reservation fees etc on my aborted purchase


I hear you and agree that is some ways it can be good to verify funds/AIP first to ensure that the buyer has the sufficient funds. There are stories of potential buyers viewing a property, making an offer which is accepted and only then the buyers apply for a mortgage to be rejected. I guess one way is to have the EA confirm the AIP with the mortgage provider without divulging any details.


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## m4rkymark (Aug 17, 2014)

It's here in writing what the EA must do - law just says they must do it promptly, no mention of any timescales.

https://www.gov.uk/buy-sell-your-home/estate-agents


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## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

Gixxer6 said:


> I hear you and agree that is some ways it can be good to verify funds/AIP first to ensure that the buyer has the sufficient funds. There are stories of potential buyers viewing a property, making an offer which is accepted and only then the buyers apply for a mortgage to be rejected. I guess one way is to have the EA confirm the AIP with the mortgage provider without divulging any details.


Rightly or wrongly I think EA are a part of the "problem", conscious we have at least one on here 

At the outset totally on your side, at the point of sale agreed in principle they are neutral and by the end they are practically working against you advising you should take a hit on previously agreed price as some crank in a survey has stated something obvious that buyer goes to town on.

I've never viewed a property without having a sale agreed on mine at the least and I'd never make an offer I wasn't confident that I wouldn't be able to see through.

Got to be a better system than what we have.


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## m4rkymark (Aug 17, 2014)

MDC250 said:


> Got to be a better system than what we have.


The Scottish system...


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## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

m4rkymark said:


> The Scottish system...


Better but not perfect. Can still end up shelling out for surveys before making offer which could be rejected.


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## m4rkymark (Aug 17, 2014)

MDC250 said:


> Better but not perfect. Can still end up shelling out for surveys before making offer which could be rejected.


I've always offered subject to survey and never had an issue on offers being accepted. You can also tap into a survey if someone else has already surveyed the property and it costs less. Your right though it's not a perfect system...


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## HarryHedgehog (Aug 13, 2013)

Beat them at the game, and as your going to use a solicitor (odds on!) have a letter from your solicitor confirm they have seen proof of ID etc... and they are ready and waiting to act on your behalf once a deal is agreed.

I've been on both sides, and had a few times the BS of ooh yes we have an AIP/DIP when they are talking absolute rubbish.. screws timeframes up esp last year when the banks were being even more anal than usual!

You have to show it, so prove your deadly serious, and have all the prep work in place - also prevents them from trying to 'guide' you onto their own staff..


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## pantypoos (Aug 7, 2014)

shane_ctr said:


> Agents are required by law to put your offer to the vendor in writing within twenty four hours unless the vendor has instructed the agent not to contact him about offers below a certain level.
> 
> I know of many agents who do not do this.


As above, it is the law.


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## The_Bouncer (Nov 24, 2010)

MDC250 said:


> I think it's what EA should have done in the past but have never bothered.
> 
> It's a pile of BS anyway, years ago an elderly couple were buying my flat and day before exchange pulled out as their investments were not worth as much as they thought, seriously?!. Cost me a good few grand in surveyors fees, mortgage reservation fees etc on my aborted purchase


I had the same in 2008 - buyers pulled out day before exchange. - The EA's were pretty useless but still insisted on their fees.

Eventually sold 4 months later and overall with the then hit in market values + commissions it ended up costing me just shy of £50,000

My instructions to the EA's after, was not to accept offer unless it was very clear the other party had no issues preceding.

I have a pet hate for unscrupulous estate agents. My house at the time was over the £400k mark and it felt to me they just saw ££££ signs without actually doing much work.

I can understand as a seller, if they place instructions like this to the EA


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## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

pantypoos said:


> As above, it is the law.


I phoned the EA on Tuesday and made an offer but was told they can't pass on any offers to the vendor unless the EA has received AIP/proof of deposit. I provided the information they asked for on Thursday. Today is Friday and I haven't heard a peep from the EA, no idea if my offer has been accepted or rejected. Offer was reasonable as a first offer too. 
We're not in a chain, have all required funds, ready to go but being stalled by the EA.


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## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

The_Bouncer said:


> I had the same in 2008 - buyers pulled out day before exchange. - The EA's were pretty useless but still insisted on their fees.
> 
> Eventually sold 4 months later and overall with the then hit in market values + commissions it ended up costing me just shy of £50,000
> 
> ...


I agree, as a seller it does protect you from a sale falling through if the buyer provides proof of funds. As a buyer in my current position it's very frustrating dealing with this particular EA.

Just a thought .... Maybe a better system is to provide no proof of funds upfront, make an offer, offer is accepted then the buyer has 24-48 hours to provide proof of funds. If the 24-48 hours lapses then the offer is automatically rejected. This system could encourage potential buyers to get their AIP approved first before even making an offer but not showing it to the EA until the offer is accepted.


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## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

The_Bouncer said:


> I had the same in 2008 - buyers pulled out day before exchange. - The EA's were pretty useless but still insisted on their fees.
> 
> Eventually sold 4 months later and overall with the then hit in market values + commissions it ended up costing me just shy of £50,000
> 
> ...


You win, ouch 

Would just be nice if buyer and seller were always on the same page.

Respect to buyers on my parents place, he got a job offer out of the blue so needed to pull out. He made sure they were not out of pocket and the market picked up a little afterwards so it ended reasonably well for them...other than their next buyer's mortgage falling through on the day of completion


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## nbray67 (Mar 22, 2012)

We had the same thing 2 yrs ago when we were looking to buy a house much more expensive than the one we were selling.

They actually wanted all the a aip info before we could even view ffs!

After a couple of heated tel calls that got us nowhere I told the EA to stick it as we had seen a different house, the one we are now in. Low and behold, 4 wks later we had the 1st EA calling us offering us a viewing no strings attached and if we liked it they even told us what offer to put in which was 15k lower than what it was up for!

I just laughed and told them they were a complete shower to me and to their customer. William H Brown where we live is who they were.

EA's are a law unto themselves and deserve the stick they get.


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## Rayaan (Jun 1, 2014)

I just recently sold my house and yes they do ask for proof of funds and ID.

Personally, I think its a better system - too many bloody buyers around who say they'll buy the house and then they dont actually have the funds to buy it at the agreed price. Of course, you always get those who try to get a discount of £30-40k on a house already listed under market value. 

Remember that the seller is going to be paying the estate agents 1% + VAT. If they keep sending buyers over with no way of funding the property then they arent going to get their fee are they?

Seriously think about it - lets say I have a property on for sale at £800k. I dont want people wasting my time with viewings which last an hour each when they dont have the funds in place already


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## Dannbodge (Sep 26, 2010)

When we bought our house we had an offer accepted before we had even spoken to any mortgage companies or a broker.


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## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

Rayaan said:


> I just recently sold my house and yes they do ask for proof of funds and ID.
> 
> Personally, I think its a better system - too many bloody buyers around who say they'll buy the house and then they dont actually have the funds to buy it at the agreed price. Of course, you always get those who try to get a discount of £30-40k on a house already listed under market value.
> 
> ...


I agree, as a seller it makes sense but as a buyer I feel it's not a fair system where I'm asked to provide my AIP to the estate agent disclosing *exactly* how much we can borrow BEFORE even making an offer. The agent holds all the cards and knows how high they can potentially go. Of course the buyer can set a maximum limit and stick to their guns.


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## Darlofan (Nov 24, 2010)

Makes you wonder why estate agents still exist. Afterall what they do can so easily be done yourself on the Internet. I know there are online sites where you take photos etc and get a board to put up but they're not that popular. Valuing it is the hardest thing they do and let's be honest the way they do that is to see similar properties that are on the market and work it out from there.


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## Rayaan (Jun 1, 2014)

Darlofan said:


> Makes you wonder why estate agents still exist. Afterall what they do can so easily be done yourself on the Internet. I know there are online sites where you take photos etc and get a board to put up but they're not that popular. Valuing it is the hardest thing they do and let's be honest the way they do that is to see similar properties that are on the market and work it out from there.


I agree. There needs to be some sort of website where you just put houses up. HomeTrader sounds good lol


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## Gixxer6 (Apr 5, 2014)

There are a few online estate agents which seem to have some good reviews. Unfortunately they're not too popular so there aren't too many houses advertised.
The two online agents below seem to get good reviews:

https://www.emoov.co.uk/
http://www.housenetwork.co.uk/


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## WP-UK (Apr 24, 2011)

Hello, I'm an estate agent... :devil: :wave:

Different companies work in different ways. We have a duty of care to our client (the vendor) to ensure we secure the best price and best buyer. Part of the process we provide is making sure buyers are financially qualified.

Where I work, the first time to ask about finances is on registration. 9/10 buyers will answer 'AIP with Nationwide £30k deposit' etc and all is happy. I'm well aware they could lie but we have done our job at that time. 

Upon offer, we again clarify finances in a bit more detail, ask for IFA details etc. I would say a good 80-90% either volunteer to email an AIP over or agree when asked. All we are doing is qualifying that the buyer is proceedable. There is no tactic to this from our end. 

Look at it from the other side, when you're selling your house and the agent puts together a sale without asking for financial information and 3 weeks later the buyers haven't (and can't) get a mortgage, who's head is on the chopping board? 

Personally, if a buyer won't provide an AIP, I of course still refer the offer as per requirements to my client but let them know I can not qualify financially as the buyer refused to provide this. Especially if there are multiple offers, that will see that buyer blown out the water pretty fast by the vendor unless they comply.

It sounds like in this instance the EA's tact wasn't the best with how they handled it to be fair. All companies are different though, all agents are different - pop the brush back in to the tar. :thumb:


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