Issue with sellers

als1124 · October 2011

When we placed the offer on our home, we put in the contract that all existing light fixtures/fans were to remain and were included in the purchase of the home. The sellers signed off on it.

Today we were there for inspections, and 3 ceiling fans have been removed and the dining room, foyer, kitchen and 2 hallway lights have been replaced with crappy fixtures. My agent called the selling agent and she said something like "I'll talk to my clients, but I can't control them".

I know we have the option of walking, which I don't want to do, because I LOVE the house. If they do not replace those items, do I have any legal recourse against them?

car_ramrod · October 2011

I am not sure if you have any legal recourse, I am sure you do but the cost of involving lawyers would eat up anything you will get out of it. I would definitely put together an addendum to the contract lowering the sales price to take into account the replacement cost of the fixtures. So if the fixtures will cost $1000 to replace including labor, lower the sales price by this amount. If they don't agree, the only recourse will be sueing (again, money intensive) or walking. What a crappy situation!

ArcadianDreams · October 2011

I agree with the pp. Plus, unless you having photos showing what the original fixtures looked like I doubt making a claim they were changed would hold up in court anyway. That's pretty lame of the sellers to do (is it an investor? Because I can't imagine why you would take them with you anyway). I would do what the pp said and make an estimate of what they will cost to replace, and try to addendum the contract, but $$-wise I doubt it's worth making a giant fuss over either way. Even good fans are only like $100-$150.

vanillacourage · October 2011

I would include cash for the fixtures replacement in your post inspection negotiations.

curlylocks3 · October 2011

I would try to negotiate whatever amount off the purchase price to replace the items.

DownToEarthGirl · October 2011

I'm so shocked that people don't read their own contract and that their RE wouldn't say, "Oh, so sorry, I'll talk with them about the contract."

In the grand scheme of things it would be way easier to buy new fans than pull them down from their new place (I assume that's probably what they did) and put them back, so I'm guessing they'll give you $500 off or something like that to replace them yourself. Sorry, that is such an inconvienence.

als1124 · October 2011

Update-- They are now claiming to be "deeply hurt by the allegation that light fixtures/fans were removed". They claim that the missing items were all removed prior to our showing (which is totally not true). The messed up part, is that they mortgaged the house to the teeth and took home equity loans. It's a short sale and the bank is walking with half of what they owe. So they used the bank's money to buy all this stuff, and they told their agent they can't put it back b/c it was already sold on Craigslist. And....the fridge that is on the list on inclusions? They said they were leaving it as a "token of good faith instead of selling it on craigslist". WTF?

Issue with sellers

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