Why are some sellers being hit with two bills for selling one house?

Dual-fee disputes, in which sellers face paying commission to two agencies, have become the “biggest systemic issue” in sales, says Katrine Sporle, the property ombudsman. Complaints about this issue to the adjudication service more than doubled in a year to 72 in 2018; it has already received 25 in 2019. “One of the big agencies told me it had 400 cases on their books in which it believed it was due a fee that had been paid to a different agent.”

It is not just the volume of complaints that is growing: so are the sums involved. Agents are also more competitive and clued up. “Technology enables even small agents to set up alerts to check when sales go through,” says Michael Stoop, the ombudsman’s industry chairman.

In one current case, a family who sold their four-bedroom London home for about £1.5m received two claims for commission, totalling £36,000. And the time lapse can be lengthy: 18 months after exchanging on their London home, a couple in their eighties received a demand for £13,650 commission from an agent they had let go — on top of the £9,750 they’d paid a second agent for selling the £650,000 property. “They were incredibly worried,” says Sporle, who ruled that the first agent couldn’t claim commission. “It was having a detrimental effect on their health.”

The buying and selling of property is an unusual deal. “You don’t pay twice for a toaster, but you could easily get into a situation of paying twice to sell your home,” says Paula Higgins, chief executive of the HomeOwners Alliance (HOA). “It can add up to thousands of pounds, and sellers don’t find out until after they’ve moved or when they’re coming up to exchange.”

A month after Greer Bailey, 59, agreed to sell her grade II listed cottage in Fowey, Cornwall, for £515,000 through Country & Waterside Prestige (CWP), it emerged that the buyers were the same couple who had withdrawn an earlier offer when Bailey had instructed May Whetter & Grose (MWG) for seven months in 2017. “On the one hand, I was trying to get assurance from both agents that I wouldn’t have to pay two sets of fees, before exchange of contracts,” Bailey says. On the other, she had to ensure that MWG — through which she was also buying her next home — would not scupper her purchase. “It was so worrying. I had to fight tooth and nail.”

It took five months to agree that both agents would split the £7,725 commission. MWG says it offered to halve its fee “at an early stage”; CWP says it “followed clear procedures”.