Hello,
I don’t speak Chinese fluently and this is my first time selling a home.
I brought my older father when I first signed the 委託書 with 永慶房屋. I misunderstood what 低價 meant and thought it was more like the lowest I’m willing to go. That is not the case. So they found a buyer immediately who is willing to pay the lowest price and now my understanding is if I don’t agree to sell at this price I’m in breach of contract. I’m also unable to raise the price now since I signed the contract?
Any help? I misunderstood and my father who speaks Chinese also didn’t catch this before I signed. I’m a bit at a loss. Or should I just lawyer up?
Well a lawyer will just look to the contract. Lowest price sounds to me like lowest price you’d be willing to go for and that’s what you said as well? Usually you should list the price at which to start negotiations. So you got the offer and now you want a higher offer? Yeah that may be breach of contract. I’d check what the termination penalty is if it’s stated on the contract.
Yeah, I just didn’t realize that I had to sell at this price. Like if they found a buyer who was willing to go with this price I’d just be immediately obligated to sell.
I signed the contract yesterday morning. The buyers are want to meet tonight. Just felt so scammy.
Someone is saying that under Taiwan law I cancel the contract within 3 days.
Read the contract and see if it stipulates what the termination policy is. Be aware of the fact that the real estate agent is not on your side on this, since they get paid with the sale of the house.
If you sign a contract you cannot just change your mind. If you offer a price and someone accepts it then that’s it. If you made an error that’s also on you. Apple Taiwan made an error on a list price of devices and had to sell at the price offered… Someone forgot to add a zero to the total so it made a big difference.
I’m sure you now not wanting to follow a contract you signed feels scammy to the buyers. When I bought my place it was by a contract at a court. Once signed could not change the price so even if someone offered more they could not buy the property. The seller could not cancel the contract either as it was an auction buy.
No my meaning is they gave me a price range, highest to lowest. How can I be obligated to sell at the lowest price? What if there are better offers within this 3-month contract time? They literally had this buyer within 12 hours of signing the contract.
Because that is what you offered by saying this would be my lowest price and they accepted your offer? It’s called offer and acceptence.
I think you are feeling regret that a buyer was found quickly and now you think you should have asked for more. A friend of mine just bought a home recently… luckily by word of mouth. Owner stipulated a price and buyer has saved the cash so settled quickly. Later on other people said they would have paid more but too late.
Yes will the way things are done can be confusing. When I bought there was a minimum bid as it was an auction. The auction time was only for 3 hours and the bid was put in 1 minute before the auction closed. Luckily no other bidders came. A week later a woman asked to buy the place but she was … too late lol
A bit off topic: But what happened to @Marco ? I only vaguely remember reading that he bought an apartment and had some issues with the tenants still living there but he was finally able to evict them. Any other issues that came up?
I don’t know if it is in Taiwan. It isn’t illegal in the UK. I wasn’t referring to gazumping, though, I was questioning the sliding scale of an accepted range of sales prices when the lowest price on the scale is a contractual obligation. What’s the point of the highest price on the scale?
When we bought our house, we put in an offer that the agent then took to the seller to see if they would accept it. It seems a bit weird that an offer would just get automatically accepted without running it past you, the seller. There are some pretty scummy agents around in Taiwan (also probably everywhere), I would take your contract to a lawyer if I were you.