Getting gazumped.

By definition getting ‘gazumped’ means when you have a verbal agreement with a seller of a property, another buyer then offers more and then you are informed that the property has been sold. You have not been given the chance to match or better the offer, gazumped. Heartbreaking.

According to research the average home buyer searches for approx 85 days before signing on the dotted line. Saturdays are ruined with frustration, traffic jams and false advertising. The amount of time and money that is wasted is on searching for property simply staggering.

When you actually find the right home the feeling is indescribable. It really stuck with me when recently a client of ours said to me ‘the moment I walked in the door I just knew this was my new home, after 6 months of looking I knew immediately.’

 If finding the right home is a great feeling then being gazumped is the absolute opposite. Admittedly, agents often deal with buyers without remorse but the fact is at the moment it’s a sellers market and as a buyer you are very vulnerable.

Until the contract is physically exchanged the property is on the public market. A verbal agreement is not legally binding and until exchange both you and the seller can pull out of the deal without penalty. Sometimes just before exchange buyers find a better home at a better price and change their minds, equally sometimes sellers get made a last minute offer that is much better and have the right to take it.

An ethical agent (and seller) will normally give the original buyer the opportunity to match or better the new offer but this often doesn’t happen. This is a critical point, if another buyer makes a better offer and you are given the chance to match it and you refuse – you haven’t been gazumped, you have been out bid. Its easy to slam the owners for reneging on a deal but ask yourself what you would do if you were about to sell for $1.1Million and then you were offered another $50,000?

 By law estate agents must submit all offers to their clients and for some mystical reason whenever a property is close to being sold more buyers seem to come out of the woodwork. Recently we had a large prestigious home for sale for 5 months with no interest, finally a buyer showed up…2 days later another appeared and suddenly it was a heated battle to secure the property.

 So what’s the solution? Be prepared, have your finances in order and when you see the home you want don’t haggle too much. I know dozens of people that regret missing the right property over a few thousand dollars and very few that regret paying a premium for their dream home.