What does 'Deal Chasing' mean when buying a property?

Find out what Deal Chasing means when you are buying a property. 'What does Deal Chasing mean?' plus over 150 other property related terms and jargon in plain English

Deal Chasing

You might have read or heard some estate agents employ "Deal Chasers" or, if you've had an offer accepted on a property, your agent may have said something like "I'm chasing your deal regularly". What exactly do they mean?

YIf you have had an offer accepted but you have not exchanged contracts yet there is nothing legally binding about the transaction. You can decide not to buy and the vendor can decide not to sell.

The time from Sale Agreed to Exchange of Contracts can take weeks or months because of the paperwork that needs to be put together and this relies on multiple parties delivering.

All the steps and who is involved in delivering them are detailed in my ebook How to Really Buy a Property so if you want to get ahead of the game pick up a copy!

Now if we left all these different parties to do things in their own time things really would take forever and that is not a good idea because Time Costs Deals.

The way to shorten timescales is to be the noisiest person in the room (and there are many rooms). That doesn't mean being impolite or rude or shouting, its about being the one transaction that all the parties would like to get off their desk because then you would stop calling them every day!

This approach is known as "Deal Chasing" because you are "chasing up" different people all the time.

Who you can chase depends on your position. As a buyer you can chase your solicitor but you can't talk to the vendor's solicitor (he acts for the vendor, not you). Estate agents can talk to everyone and if they are competent they'll be skilled at deal chasing which not only keeps everyone on their toes but smooths over possible pitfalls.

For example, in one transaction where I was the vendor my solicitor (for complex reasons beyond my control) was a fiery Italian by the name of Stefano. He would generally be annoyed by everyone and shout at everyone, including me! But when you're dealt certain cards you just have to play them.

After he had sent out the paperwork to the buyers solicitor he told me " ... and if they come back with any questions I'm just going to tell them to go to the property and answer the questions themselves!".

I said (in as calm a voice as possible), "Look, Stefano, I really don't mind answering a few questions. Just call me if they send anything through and I'll pop in and answer them". He growled a bit but agreed.

Buyers solicitors always send questions - it kind of shows everyone they're doing their job - even if the questions are fairly pointless like "When was the last time the windows were painted?"

Now you might think that's a valid question but actually a buyer should only ask questions which will make or break a deal. If I asked the buyer "If I tell you the windows were last painted 20 years ago would you pull out of the deal?" They would invariably say "No".

Sometimes the questions are just a bulk standard list so the window painting question is there even though the property has UPVC units!

Anyway in my little story the buyers sent through 3 pages of questions and Stefano wanted to go ballistic but I persuaded him it was no big deal and we actually answered them all in less than an hour.

This isn't about doing everything the buyer wants and dancing to their tune. Its about avoiding unnecessary conflict.

There is a time to be firm. In this tale it was 4 weeks after I'd accepted the buyers offer and all the paperwork was in place to allow exchange of contracts but exchange wasn't happening. I called the agent who called the buyer (its always best to go via the agent where one exists for reasons I explain in the ebook) and found out they were still not sure which insurance company they wanted to use and were looking for other quotes.

I told the agent to read them the riot act. If the insurance policy cost was going to be a deal breaker then let's break the deal now and get the property back on the market. They exchanged that morning.

On the flip side you as the buyer can do plenty of deal chasing as well. If your solicitor says "I'm sending out further inquiries" which means I'm asking the vendor to reply to some questions then ask him or her for those questions. If any aren't a deal breaker for you check with your solicitor if the mortgage provider needs them and if not, strike them out.

You can even knock out ones you know to be irrelevant (like "When was the last time the windows were painted?" when you know the property has UPVC windows).

S/he is your solicitor, you pay him/her, you instruct him/her.

One of the key aims of my ebook How to Really Buy a Property is to let you know how to chase a deal - especially if the estate agent is fairly incompetent - so you know what is reasonable and what isn't. What needs to be chased and when. When to smooth over a conflict and when to put your foot down. In short - how to "Deal Chase" effectively.