The Safe Way to Make Your Offer
Pre-Purchase Legal Advice Report
Have us advise you on the Section 32 Vendor's Statement and the Contract. We will quickly identify unfair, onerous and non-standard terms and conditions.
You may instruct us by downloading our Information Form. (To access our Information Form you will need a copy of Adobe Acrobat Reader, available free from the Adobe site.)
Download our Pre-Purchase Information Form
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Altering the vendor's contract
If you use the vendor's contract to make your offer, you will have the vendor's conditions imposed on you. Some of these can be
quite onerous and expensive. (e.g. there may be "fine print" that requires you to pay GST on top of the purchase price, or you
may be required to pay some of the vendor's legal costs.)
We can advise on changes to be made to the contract to ensure you are protected.
What if the vendor doesn't like it?
It's OK if the vendor isn't quite satisfied with your initial offer. If the vendor wants to change something (perhaps the vendor doesn't want you to have a building inspection) then the vendor will alter your offer and return it to you. This is usually done by way of a counter-offer.
By making a counter-offer the vendor is effectively saying,
"I'm not entirely happy with your offer to me, so I will make an offer to you on my terms." The correct way for a vendor to make a counter-offer is to make alterations to your offer, then sign it, and submit it to you or your conveyancing lawyer for acceptance.
IMPORTANT ADVANTAGE: This procedure ensures that you know about any changes that the vendor may make to the contract, and you can get advice on them before accepting.
What if the estate agent doesn't like it?
It is against the law for an estate agent to interfere with a purchaser's offer, and the law requires the estate agent to promptly deliver all offers to the vendor.
The estate agent has no right to pressure a purchaser into changing an offer, or using any particular form of contract or contract note. If the estate agent becomes difficult, and tries
to have you change your offer before submitting it to the vendor, we can step in on your behalf.
Everyone is treated fairly
The process of offer and counter-offer ensures that everyone is treated fairly.
The offer is passed from purchaser to vendor, back and forth, until everyone's concerns and have been dealt with. When both parties are satisfied the deal is finalised.
This process also means that it is less likely that a purchaser will want to cancel the sale because of
misleading or deceptive conduct, or anxiety generated through unfair or overwhelming liabilities.
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