estate agent contract AR

[Lomie]

Does anyone know about estate agent contracts that can advise me please? My OH has stupidly (against my advice to do a shorter term) signed a sole agency contract to sell his house for 16 weeks, this was on 16th October. He is struggling to sell the house and we both think the EA could do more to sell it, the house isnt on their website and he belatedly got an explanation after chasing them up that they are having problems with their I.T, I had to nag him to get them to put it on Rightmove some 2 weeks after it went on sale and he has only ever had 2 phonecalls from them, all the rest has been done by him. He has had several viewings and the overall feedback is that it needs work which is putting buyers off, even though the EA's said not to do anything to it. All in all I think he should put it on with another agent after Xmas as I think the EA's he's using now arent doing a good job.
Where do we stand with breaking the contract legally as I think we have a reason as the EA arent fullfilling their half of the contract by showing minimal effort to sell.

thanks in advance.

[LibertyGal72]

Where do we stand with breaking the contract legally as I think we have a reason as the EA arent fullfilling their half of the contract by showing minimal effort to sell.

thanks in advance.

I think this is key - what does the contract say about what they will do about selling the property?

List the things he has had to chase them for and start drawing up a letter about the things they haven't done. Once your certain of your position I'd be inclined to tell them if a, b, c is not done you will treat them as in breach of contract.

Also, can we have a link (by pm of you prefer) to the property (assuming it is on rightmove now). Might be able to give some advice for letter

[Lomie]

oh thanks LG, I'll pm you just incase! I 'll get him to do that, I know it sounds as though we just want to have our cake and eat it but I can see it sat idle for months on end at this rate if they dont push the sale.

[LibertyGal72]

Hiya. Have checked out pics and stuff. There's loads the EA ought to do. Even if he sticks with the EA you need to kick some butt!

Sorry if I have written a bit too much on the PM, but once I got going...hope you can use some of the feedback anyhow. Good luck. And let us how you do xx

[Lomie]

I've replied to your PM, and thank you so much,very helpful!

[Fiz]

Examine the agent's contract and see what they say they will do about selling it - ours, for instance, stated advertising in the local paper, put it on Rightmove, on their own website, sending out matches. If they are not sticking to that then you could raise the issues that they are not abiding by.

But as the house is getting viewings, they must be doing some promotion. Do you think it needs work doing, or is that another way of saying that the price is too high? Did he go with what the agent suggested?

Good luck, it's so stressful isn't it?!

[Lomie]

hi Fiz, it shis house so he's done everything, I did pick out EA's who had a good website etc but obviously that has failed! Theyve said not to drop the price as its correct for the area,I hate doing that anyway as people always offer less than the asking and if they do their homework they will see from online thats its been price dropped which I think sets off alarm bells, I think its the fact that it does need work and is empty so alot of imagination is needed when viewing-people just dont want to do the work.
He is going to take it off the market today and then look at putting it back on after Xmas when hes installed a kitchen and done a few tidy up jobs to it, then get the EA (new or current one) to take better pics and include a floorplan as I think now it does really need it and see what happens as hes not in a position to rent it out, he needs to sell it.

Thanks for the advice, I'll let you know what happens!