“Once you have paid the buyers fee, service goes dramatically downhill...”
1 Star Review
Sep 28,2023
By:
'Lucy'
Sep 28,2023
Branch: Watford, Building 4, Hatters Lane,
Services: I bought a property using them
Sold price: £190500
Would you recommend?: No
Postcode: OX4
Branch: Watford, Building 4, Hatters Lane,
I bought a property using them
Sold price: £190500
Postcode: OX4
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We viewed a flat in Oxford which was marketed by Yopa and up for auction. The empty property had no chain, had initially been brought to the market a year earlier, and had two failed sales. We used the 'buy now' service on the site and immediately paid the required £6,900 buyer's fee required to remove the property from the market. Two months later, the sales process has become protracted and the communication from the seller's solicitor to ours has stalled. As things stand, we have already invested close to £7000 in this process (not including solicitors fees so far) and are frustrated and dissatisfied.
We contacted our Yopa agent, stating that we were tempted to withdraw from the process if things did not move along and if communication from the sellers did not sharpen. We explained the appeal of the purchase from our perspective was that sellers wanted a swift and a smooth sale, and that, despite being a cash buy and the surveys apparently already in place, it did not look to complete within the Yopa contract's fifty six business day window.
My expectation was that he would assist with moving things along and liaising with the seller - that is the role of the agent. Instead, he phoned me from his car and rather than helpful, it was clear that he was irritated and annoyed. His response was that we were getting the property 'reduced', that he wasn't prepared to show us the property again if were planned to withdraw. He complained that he wouldn't get paid if we withdrew and that this was all a draw on his time, which he clearly resented, and questioned how he was 'supposed to get hold of a solicitor' on a Friday afternoon. Only after we reminded him that his issue should be with the seller rather than us, did he say he would chase them. When we asked for another viewing of the flat, he said that he wasn't inclined to show us round on a Sunday because he could be spending time with his family instead. His suggestion to sort the issue out with the delays was for us to simply stop asking so many questions about the property, stating that he himself had previously bought properties without completing full conveyancing due diligence and that we could do the same.
We expected Yopa and our Yopa agent to help with this process from start to finish, not simply provide a finders service. It is clear, however, that once we paid that buyers fee and now that we are financially locked in, the 'friendly friendly' approach has been dropped, and our agent no longer feels any obligation to be helpful or even polite and that, as buyers, our requests are regarded as unreasonable and clearly an enormous irritation. The Yopa agent set-up allows for overly familiar and unprofessional communications from the agent and lines to be crossed, which would likely not occur in an office.
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