housing rant part 2

Persuant to my previous rant about flat-hunting, I have had some more 'encounters'. This time, we had our eyes on a little flat on Manion avenue in Rose Bay (again 'little'... maybe next time I'll talk about the housing affordability in sydney-or the lack thereof). The unit is really quite desirable, but it still needed a ton of work: repainting, reflooring, and a new bathtub. We negotiated an offer which was accepted almost right away. However, after the real-estate agent told us "congratulations, the vendor's accepted your offer", we didn't hear from her again for days. Naturally this makes us really nervous. Then on a Friday evening, we get home and we discover this message from the agent: "Deliver the signed contract to me right away. There is someone else viewing it tomorrow morning, and I can guarantee you he's going to put in a better offer". It was 6:30pm. Our solicitor's gone home. There was nothing we could do.

How is the agent's message dodgy? Let me count the ways:

1. Since when do the agents, who are supposed to be friendly facilitators of housing transactions, use imperatives in their sentences without apending the "please"es?
2. Does the term "oral contract" mean nothing in real-estate? I thought the offer had been agreed upon? But I know better now, and I will refrain from judging the agents too much next time they pretend the vendor did not agree on a deal with us.
3. If the agent was so sure a higher offer was coming in 24 hours, why would she demand our signed contract, which would bring the vendors less money?
4. If the other buyer was seeing the flat for the first time in the morning, what are the chances he would put down a high offer in the afternoon without having inspected the strata company or carried out further inspections in the unit?

We decided that this agent was trying to 'hedge". Our theory was confirmed by the following events.

Being nervous about losing the flat, we told the agent on Saturday morning that the contract had been ready to pick up. She called us back, left a message saying she'd get it on Monday. On Monday, she said to me "you know, we've never even known if you wanted to sign the contract, and now the other buyer has given usa better offer". She then proceeded to give me, within a 5k range, how much the other offer was. I questioned the existence of "the other buyer". She said she would provide proof after I gave her a written and signed higher offer.

So, below are my observations:
1. She was lying to me point-blank: they've had our contract, or known about its existence at least, for two days (agents in sydney work on saturdays). We know this because she actually called us back after we left our message about the contract being ready.
2. To the real estate agent, our contract had ceased being a legal document that needed to be executed. It had become a tool with which they pressured the other buyer into making an offer above the so and so price.
3. She attempted to get us to increase our previously negotiated and accepted offer, to exceed the newly negotiated and accepted offer made by the other buyer. She was staging a private bidding war between two bidders... except we both thought we'd won the place!

Anyhoo, and this is the clincher.. This agent, this person, this individual, did this to us (i.e. delay signing of agreed offer, in order to 'hedge' the price) for the second time! We had ourselves to blame for being seduced by the flat so much that we did not heed the little voice that said "it's that woman again!"

This episode ellicited some dark thoughts within.. like, why is it illegal to club the head of someone who truly deserves it? Well, only for a short time anyway. But we wisened up. From this experience, we learned the following points:

1. Oral agreements are nothing. get both your and vendor's signaturs on that contract.
2. If you have legal guns, get them out. Make them earn their money. Set them on agents who act dodgy.
3. If an oral agreement is accepted, do your best to pressure the agents to remove the sales ads, or at least add an indication that a sale for the property is being finallized (such as the words "under offer"). Normally, people back off when they see that the property is within days of being formally sold. There are exceptions though. But This is what I would do anyway.

So the conclusion, we endeavoured to abide by these rules, and now have finally bough a place, after 8 months of searching!