Purple Bricks,

[Quasar]

Hello All,

I signed up with purple bricks as their agent said they could sell my house at the price i wanted in an average of 3 weeks.

3 months later nothing, the agent is not actively promoting the house like a shop estate agent would.
Its basically a very expensive listing site,

does anyone know of any way to come out of purple bricks and not pay their stupid pay now later fee, as i am now going with an estate agent.

Regards
Q.

[Amethyst]

Re: Purple Bricks,

So you have an agreement with 'Close Brothers' for the pay later 'deal'.

e have partnered with Close Brothers to offer all of our customers the choice not to pay anything at the time when they engage us to sell their property. You can pay later via a direct debit from your bank account when any of the following occurs, whichever happens first:

When the property sells and the legal process is complete;
If you withdraw your instructions for us to market the property;
If you withdraw from using eZie® Conveyancing;
Ten months from the date when you agree to use our services.

Can't see a general copy of Purple Bricks terms - presumably it is a £798 to list your property regardless of whether it sells or not and you just chose whether to pay now or later. If it doesn't sell within 10 months you get a refund/don't need to pay ?

do you have a copy of the contract/s ?

[Amethyst]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Cancellations and refunds

Once you have ordered Products and Services you will be charged immediately by Purplebricks whether you choose to Pay Now or Pay Later. Where you choose Pay Later you will not pay for the Products and Services until payment is due in accordance with the Pay Later Terms.

Should you wish to cancel or withdraw any Products and Services you may do so at any time. However, under no circumstances will any full or part credit be made in respect of Advertised Rates. Further Advertised Rates may be payable to reinstate any removed or suspended Products and Services.

You can withdraw your advert at any time by clicking on the ‘remove advert’ icon on your property page in the eZie® platform. In certain circumstances you may be able to re-list the property within a designated period after withdrawal. Details will be made available at the time of seeking to withdraw/relist your Advert.

In the event that you cancel your advert or any Products and Services and have chosen to Pay Later we will notify the Provider as such circumstances represent the Deferred Payment Date.

https://www.purplebricks.com/terms/S...ent/#section-5

Have you discussed your case with Purple Bricks btw ?

[Quasar]

Re: Purple Bricks,

No Refund what so ever after 10 months, and when that time hit - one is just forgotten about.

Well ive emailed my "agent" last week with my issues and have not heard back.

I dont have any terms and conditions of a contract as such, its just agreeing to the spiel in the link as you have posted above.

Speaking to another Estate Agent, who are actually a friend of my partner, they say you might be able to get out of the contract... but didnt say how, as thats down to me !!!

Wouldnt know where to start !!

[RandomUsername]

Re: Purple Bricks,

@ Quasar, thanks for starting the thread. The information you have provided is, if you don't mind me saying, rather vague, and given that I am personally deciding whether or not to use Purple Bricks (PB), I consider this thread to be of potential interest.

I have to consider that looking around the net for references to PB's service, any alleged customer feedback could be bull. I feel it's highly likely some high street agents will have gone undercover to condemn PB, and PB likewise claiming how wonderful they are in disguise. For these reasons I am keeping a very open mind. Do any Legal Beagles members have experience of on line agents?

Reference your advert Quasar, in the interests of privacy I am not expecting you to divulge the exact address, however if you did wish to show a link to it it would be welcomed.

1. When did you advertise the property
2. Who valued it
3. Do you honestly think the advertised price was one that "would encourage a sale"
4. What type of property is it and price
5. Main road position or anything of concern to buyer such as near landfill site, mobile phone mast, pylons, opp' pub, petrol station
6. How many viewings did you get
7. How many if any offers did you get
8. Did you have it listed for a full 10 months?

Having been looking on line for the last 3 months for exactly what I want, in certain areas where there appears to be too much high street agents competition, a staggeringly high number of properties are so over priced it defies belief, and in many cases it's agents fooling sellers as to what they can expect just in order to get the business.

I feel it is unfair to come on simply slating PB without giving us some solid background to your case. Please answer the questions as above. Thanks.

[Kati]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Reference your advert Quasar, in the interests of privacy I am not expecting you to divulge the exact address, however if you did wish to show a link to it it would be welcomed.

1. When did you advertise the property
2. Who valued it
3. Do you honestly think the advertised price was one that "would encourage a sale"
4. What type of property is it and price
5. Main road position or anything of concern to buyer such as near landfill site, mobile phone mast, pylons, opp' pub, petrol station
6. How many viewings did you get
7. How many if any offers did you get
8. Did you have it listed for a full 10 months?

Personally [MENTION=42040]Quasar[/MENTION], I wouldn't be answering any of these (unless you wanted to of course). What does it matter "when you advertised the property" or "who valued it"? I think you stated your case quite sufficiently in your first post, and answered the questions [MENTION=6]Amethyst[/MENTION] asked you quite adequately as well

I feel it is unfair to come on simply slating PB without giving us some solid background to your case. Please answer the questions as above. Thanks.

As I said previously, I don't see the need for the Quasar to answer these questions, they asked for advice due to their own issues with the company. If you are here to ask for peoples opinions of Purple Bricks, then you are more than welcome to start your own thread asking just that by clicking the "post new thread" button at the top of THIS LINK where I am sure you will get replies from more than just the one poster.

K

[RandomUsername]

Re: Purple Bricks,

@ Kati thanks for the reply and I will start a new thread later.

However, the time line of emails from Quasar are only across 5 days. When I read a series of negative postings about a company that I might be considering doing business with, which appear to contain totally misleading information, I have the need to question it.

In the original posting of 16 July it is stated "I signed up with purple bricks as their agent said they could sell my house at the price i wanted in an average of 3 weeks. 3 months later nothing, the agent is not actively promoting the house like a shop estate agent would. Does anyone know of any way to come out of purple bricks and not pay their stupid pay now later fee."

From those comments above it's fair to say the property had been advertised for just 3 months at the time of the posting?

Yet on 20 July the following statement appears: "No Refund whatsoever after 10 months, and when that time hit - one is just forgotten about. Well ive emailed my "agent" last week with my issues and have not heard back."

How is the difference of 7 months explained over just 5 days?

[Kati]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Maybe [MENTION=42040]Quasar[/MENTION] meant that for the first three months there was no advertising etc... but after that there was some :noidea:

I don't think the timeline is anything to be concerned about ... the OP has made their position quite clear IMO

[Quasar]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Purple Bricks are bascially just a listing site, also when you click PAY LATER - there is no warning or prompt that you will be forced to use their econveycay and be charged another £800.

I have again emailed my agent Friday just gone, and still no replies.

What i eman by 10 months, is, your house stays on the site, listed for as long as it can... I cannot see where they are trying to sell my house or promote it like an estate agent would.

Bascially i am NOT getting my moneys worth and mentioned to the Agent back in April, ideally i want house sold By October, his reply was, no problem.

All being said - i want to come away from purple brick and not pay. 4 months and only 3 viewings, thats awful.

[RandomUsername]

Re: Purple Bricks,

@ quasar many thanks for the reply, I will answer in same order as yours.

As I understand it PB are the gateway to your property being advertised on Rightmove, Zoopla, etc, which is where most of the business is conducted in the housing market anyhow.

Now the one thing I have to share concerns with you on is the conveyancing. Firstly £800 in conveyancing would be about the max I would expect to pay with a local solicitor I use. If it were carried out with the utmost professionalism then that amount would be fine, but I would not risk anyone doing the conveyancing that I didn't already know.

For all we know, PB might have changed the wording on the conveyancing matters on their site since your listing, so what I see now might not be what you saw four months ago. Even so, in its current form it looks designed to potentially confuse you into taking the conveyancing service.

The trouble is in your earlier entries you have worded it so that 10 months has already elapsed and you've condemned them outright, that's grossly unfair on PB and very misleading to anyone potentially considering PB.

If you are on Rightmove, Zoopla etc, and potentially only paying £800 to sell your house, and getting all the viewings that have been requested from PB, then you are getting what that sum of money buys. Only 3 viewings suggests to me you need to carry out more research of your own, perhaps it's simply over priced.

At a high street agent, the lowest rate you'd probably pay is 1% + VAT. You have to weigh up the difference in property value versus PB fees, versus high street fees. If PB haven't sold your house at the advertised price then what chance do you think a high street agent has, they all use the same tools of the trade, Rightmove, Zoopla etc.

[Quasar]

Re: Purple Bricks,

I feel you are writing on Behalf Of PB,

2 estate agents have told me they are very confident in selling the house for 3 to 8 thousand more than what i have listed on Pb.

One estate agent is only going to charge me £1200 to push for a sale and a closing percentage of 0.7%
Also on right move the estate agent pays for the property to be a premium listing, Pb does not do that.

[RandomUsername]

Re: Purple Bricks,

The people I'm writing on behalf of, are myself primarily, which is why I started reading the thread, but you can now assume anyone else who wants a genuinely informative opinion of PB.

I can assure you, that if I were writing on behalf of PB, I would have simply contacted the LB site team requesting the thread be removed for condemnatory comments made about the business without any meaningful evidence.

Trust me, I'm just a neutral passenger on this ride.

[RandomUsername]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Anyone still doubting my neutrality? You won't be after reading this.

Sadly Purple Bricks have uploaded one of the most ridiculous sets of photographs in terms of the order in which they have been presented, that I have ever seen. The property in the link was listed today. The main photos, that's numbers 1 & 2, I kid you not, are of an oven, whilst the only exterior photo of the bungalow itself is at number 7 of 7. Even the dolls house in photo 6 occupies a higher placing than the bungalow. For all we know the vendor might have requested the photo's be placed in the order shown, but I think that's unlikely.

Reference the only exterior photo of the bungalow, it's hardly professional to leave a gate half open in the foreground and moving the wheely bins out of sight would have taken only moments and improved the presentation of what is actually a decent property. On the plus side I must fully commend PB for their bull-free description of the property.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-...-52110863.html

[RandomUsername]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Out of interest I just happened to click back on the link above to see if the property had sold. Take a look yourself and bear in mind what I said about the ridiculous photos in the Purple Bricks advertisement in the previous posting:
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-...-52110863.html
Quote: "Sold by another agent."
Should we be surprised?

[Snoopy1948]

Re: Purple Bricks,

Hi Quasar !

I have worked in estate agency (albeit 25 years ago ) and have met many people recently in the estate agency business.

Following retirement in 2013 I decided to sell my house with a view to moving to smaller accommodation, in may case an apartment. I spoke to several estate agencies in the area and the very cheapest deal that I could source was 1.25% which would have come out as £4275 commission payable including VAT. I have never considered estate agents fees to reflect the actual work done and hence I considered Purple Bricks with a one off fee of £798 incl VAT.

However, I researched the prospect of paying up front and the success I would have. The local 'property expert' who called suggested I put my house on at a price £35000 more than I anticipated but made no promises of success, time scales or anything else. Apart from that he was very professional.

To sell effectively through Purple Bricks, I have concluded the following :

* Your house has to be sellable and as such attractive to buyers
* You cannot guarantee success and as such I punted £798 upfront versus a minimum of £4275 through a traditional agent
* You have to be proactive in your sale, maintain contact at all times on their internet portal and be prepared to do the viewings
* You have to negotiate on any offers/deals using your local property expert
* And you have to be internet friendly!
* You have to get involved in the property details and photos. Your agent takes all photos but we agreed on which ones to use and he did make some measurement errors and information errors that I corrected with him. My property went live on Right Move 48 hours after the first visit.

Your local property expert has really made an unfounded claim if he stated you could sell in three weeks as that clearly did not happen. That suggests he was anxious for your business and therefore his own personal commission. That may be your only basis to complain that your payment was made on the strength of a promise that simply didn't happen. But you will have to make that point and possibly prove it.

I was lucky enough to sell within a few days but I had a very sellable property and a good agent should be frank with you on that one and give decent advise as to how to improve the saleability, kerbside appeal etc. A property by the same builder within half a mile of mine was still for sale with purple bricks when I completed on my sale.

And remember that marketing only occurs through internet portal such as Right Move and Zoopla and of course on their own web site. There is no one picking the phone up to push things for you. I was lucky, I took the chance and it paid off, so I can well understand how some people feel cheated if it doesn't. Their terms and conditions are very clear I have to say but in no way should they have given you a three week period to get an offer in. That is totally unprofessional. However, reading other comments above, I feel that I was particularly lucky although there are many excellent reviews on Trust Pilot.