By passing auctioneer and going to seller

I'm reeeeaaaaally annoyed at the auctioneering profession in Ireland!!!
I'm trying to purchase a house at the moment and i wouldn't trust the auctioneer as far as i could throw him!

What are the relationships between all parties involved? Can a buyer approach the seller bypassing the auctioneer? Is the seller under any obligation to the auctioneer? How much regulation is there in this area?

A

AnnoyedBuyer said:

Can a buyer approach the seller bypassing the auctioneer?

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Yes

Is the seller under any obligation to the auctioneer?

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Within Reason Yes but if the Auctioneer Misbehaves then No

How much regulation is there in this area?

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None really, Fianna Fáil is made up of Auctioneers .

when we bought our house off the plans 3 years ago we could only pick from 4 houses left in the estate. I realise now 6 months living in our house that many of the houses were held back by the builder/auctioneer so they could get a better price when the estate was nearly finished. I was a lot miffed as I would have prefered another house.

I don't see the need for an auctioneer in the sales proces when it comes to estate sales of starter homes. Maybe for more complex sales - sure.

My experience with auctioneers:

Was house shopping 6 months back...found something I liked. Went by the auctioneers - just looked at window for details and price - It stated 145k (might sound terribly cheap to most of you but this was in one of the most under-developed corners of IRL..). I looked at it some more...went to the banks - got an approval with this property in mind. Dropped by the estate agents for further details and they confirmed the price at 145k.
Rang them up sometime later - arranged a viewing - and at this stage was told the price was 210k!...they originally sold for 145k a year ago. (six months later and it still hasnt been sold).

I went on to buy - and there was only one autioneer involved in that estate...the same ones as above. I rang him up..said that I was a serious buyer - had more or less made up my mind (the builders had already let me in to see the showhouse) - said i just wanted a copy of the CAD drawings - could he arrange for them to be emailed to me. Never heard from him again.

Rang up the builder, met with him within two hours. Got a brochure and estate plan - he told me what was left. Said i didnt want to deal with the auctioneer - could i deal direct?...no problem...can he discount..no...reckoned he was obliged to pay the auctioneer regardless of dealing direct or not..as it was an agreement between them for the whole estate. Dont know whether this was bullshit or not...i honestly hope the cash was going to the builder..as the auctioneer is getting money for nothing.

Sorry...meant to also ask, if there is any auctioneers on here - which there must be....lets hear from you.

What the hell do you do for your money?

We have myhomes.ie and a whole load of other sites. We dont need you anymore...unless you can show me otherwise..


Have any builders made the break yet and sold directly??

If you're a seller, there's nothing to stop you going what the yanks call the FSBO (For Sale By Owner) route. Enter FSBO into google and you'll get plenty of insight into why this might be a good or a bad idea. Have to say I did it myself about 10 years ago and it went OK.

The auctioneer/estate agent represents the seller, not the buyer. His obligation is to get the best price for the house. Most sellers go this route because they feel the auctioneer's established name will get more potential customers to look at the property. Whether this is true in a seller's market is not so clear. But if the seller has engaged an agent there's nothing you can do about it -- you have to go through them.

In some areas of the country there seems to be an informal arrangement between competing agents to show all properties in an area to any interested customer. I assume the commission gets split between agents in this case. Kind of like the Multiple Listings Service practiced by most real estate agents in the USA, for those of you familiar with that market.

A good agent is worth his or her commission in my opinion. But it's certainly true that they have not had to work TOO hard for their money in the past decade, especially in Dublin.

Gangsters the lot of them well the ones I dealt with were it took us over a year to get a house due to the dodgy behaviour of Auctioneers, we had cases where we were bidding against ourselves! There were other interested parties just invented out of thin air to get the bidding going the worst was a sale we had fall through we managed to get a sale agreed after a long bidding war on a house which Mrs. Dobber was crazy about so we thought we were blessed, weeks went by my solicitor rang she can't get any info from the vendors solicitor who hasn't even returned a call yet so rang the auctioneer who assured me it would be sorted, another few weeks went by still nothing my solicitor rang again with new information turns out the couple who owned the house had broken up the lady was still living there and selling the property but her partner wouldn't agree to sell my solicitor advised me to pull out and get my deposit back as this could take years to resolve so off I popped to the auctioneers office to retrieve my deposit the auctioneer tried to tell me that he could close the sale within 6 weeks but I declined he also told us he was selling the house as a favour to his cousin who has had a terrible time with her ex who won't agree to sell..........We were in shock this guy was helping a family member flog their house without the consent of the joint mortgage holder without a care in the world of how it effected us or how badly we were treated and how much time was wasted bearing in mind the house prices at the time were rising fast! I was about to explode with this guy and his feeble apology was just pityful. He was lucky Mrs. Dobber was there otherwise he was getting the jabs anyhoo looked in the paper last week and a year and a half later guess what? The same house for sale again by the same auctioneer turns out it's been on the market ages, I wonder has he done the same to others?

I have the same problem auctioneers are so reluctant to sell to people who they do not know personally, I made an offer on a property and told the auctioneer and vendor solicitor that I was in funds and in a position to close with weeks. The auctioneer told me after I had given the deposit to them that the vendor was selling to someone else and they refunded my deposit after they had it for a weeks. One year later that same property was put back on the market with the same auctioneer at the same price it had not been sold despite me telling the vendors solicitor and auctioneer if anything went wrong that I would still be interested in buying the property.

What is wrong with auctioneer, it seems that they have a written code of practice not contact buyers and let them know what property they have got on the market. I can understand why they do this as it is of no benefit to the vendor who mayby wanting to sell and the auctioneer maybe keeping it on the market for her/his own benefit.

I would not trust auctioneers, bankers, builders and solicitors in Ireland as far as I could throw them.

They have got not ethics and should have a warning sign written on their forehead.

Bidding against one selve is the norm in Ireland and this can loose a sale for the vendors and should be outlaw. there is no bodie set up in Ireland to deal with all the auctioneers there because in my book all of them are crooks and should not be allow to trade. Until at least the learn how to conduct business at the moment they can do as they like with impunity.

What are the relationships between all parties involved? Can a buyer approach the seller bypassing the auctioneer? Is the seller under any obligation to the auctioneer? How much regulation is there in this area?

If the auctioneer introduced you to the property or you viewed the property by contacting the auctioneer and you subsequently buy the property directly from the seller " behind the auctioneers back " the auctioneer will probably be entitled to his commission from the vendor . I have read two local newspaper reports in the past year or so where this happened and in both cases the judge ruled in favour of the auctioneer.

Damned if we do, damned if we don't

I would not trust auctioneers, bankers, builders and solicitors in Ireland as far as I could throw them.

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Nice to know we are all tarred with the same brush...

Hmm. Not much punctuation in this thread, is there?

In rural Ireland of course there are other problems. Some sellers do not want to sell to certain buyers. There's nothing the agent can do if the seller doesn't want to sell to you personally. Sounds like this might have happened in one or two of the cases above.

Hmm. Not much punctuation in this thread, is there?
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Sorry about the punctuation, 5am in the morning not fully woken up?

This posting was taken from an Age Concern Web page posting today:

Anybody handing over their day to day financials affairs to a solicitor should be very aware. My parents did this as my father felt it was a good idea as he was getting a bit confused. They ended up charging my parents several thousand pounds. When I found out I challenged the firm and to cut a very long story short the bill was halved. Be very careful what you sign and always get a regular set of accounts.

Work colleague of mine saw house he fancied and wanted quick sale of his own. knew the rough value as he lived in an estate where all the houses are fairly well kept and of the same stature and condition. knew his price and just stuck a sign in the garden. noticed that one particular auctioneer driving around the estate paying particular attention to his homemade sign but said auctioneer ( whom he knew ) didn't call. anyway first caller offered €2,000 less than asking price. second caller offered asking price and he accepted. house sold - no auctioneer. I would love to go down this route but my house unfortunately ( or fortunately) is a one off and I have absolutely no idea of value. Two auctioneers whom I dont know offered free valuation over the phone but I am loath to ask them, as if I was tempted to sell and purchase a new house, I would probably be under obligation to whichever one of them valued the house. I would never go to an auctioneer who I was friendly with as I would definitely feel under pressure. Pal at work says the reason they offer to value free is that they might have potential buyers on their books and if the look around your property and it matches anything they are looking for they score on the double.

By all means get the "free" valuation. You will not be under any obligation to the auctioneer unless you sign a contract to this effect.

Auctioneers work for the seller so they do not have buyers on their books as such, although naturally they come into contact with interested buyers all the time. The auctioneer gets a percentage of your sale so the motivation is to get the highest possible price for you. Whether you like paying this fee or not the auctioneer is likely to know more than you do about the value of your house (including when your hopes are unrealistically high).

Anyone think a site like [broken link removed] for auctioneers would be a good idea?

Now THAT's a good idea! How quickly can you set it up brouhahaha

Bought and Sold last year. Wound up paying in or around the same money to the auctioneer and solicitor for the whole transaction. The auctioneer lied to us, ignored us and the people who bought our house. The solicitor did a great job, kept us informed of all details necessary and handled the whole transaction brilliantly.

My advice to anyone selling a house is to try to sell themselves, and if you have to deal with an auctioneer, assume that everything they tell you is a lie, that way they can't let you down.


Past30now