Property purchase & broker behavior: Is this normal?

When we personally informed the owners of the bank's valuation, the (nice) owners lost their faith. The real estate agent had done the valuation for them back then. And it already came to a value about 20% higher than the purchase price called for at that time. That had already caused him trouble with the owners because they had to "lose so much face."

Poor appraisals are a plague. We also had such a case during our search. A 50-year-old, completely scratched parquet was valued as if 80% new, the more than 30-year-old and thus immediately replaceable oil heating system was included with over 15,000, and in the end, a market adjustment factor of 1.3 was added. In the middle of nowhere. Additionally, calculations were made for the income value in which the purchase price did not even come close to being covered by the remaining useful life, even with an optimistic estimate of the cold rent. After we couldn't come to an agreement following the second viewing (the seller had a "valuation report") and canceled, the seller (private, without agent) then revealed his estimate of the renovation costs: at least €150,000. It was apparently sold after almost half a year...

We have now first of all thanked for the feedback. Written that as long as the essential documents are not available, we will wait until everything is finally clarified. Without them, we can't do much with the property anyway, and neither can the other interested parties. If the plot is still there, there is always the possibility to negotiate the price not only with the colleagues but also with the seller. We would definitely find a solution. :D

You can say that, but whether the painter cooperates is another question. ;) He has a contract with the seller, and if he can prove that the contact and thus the purchase took place due to his activity, the commission is earned—without any special achievement. Whether that is appropriate is not even asked.

Apart from that: Wasn't there something about the seller having to pay the broker (proportionally) from January onwards?

of course, that is usually settled before the notary appointment, possibly with a waiver declaration from the broker.
all this is not unusual and has been seen multiple times with others. I myself have always managed to avoid broker fees so far and could buy privately....

Regarding buying privately: I think once shared some tips here in the forum, but I can't find them for the life of me. It was a specific keyword that you should enter in the search.

Otherwise, I am also open to other tips. At the moment, it is quite difficult to get in contact with people.

Regarding buying privately: I think @11ant once threw out some tips here in the forum, but I can’t find it anymore for the life of me. It was a specific keyword you were supposed to enter in the search.

If you mean short selling: that’s actually a trap set by (mostly solid) GUs, and I hadn’t thought about it here (so far). But since you bring it up: yes, I’ve already had that from a broker. It was about an office with an amazing distant view, near Wiesbaden but just still in RLP: the landlord took it off the market again, and two or three years later the broker thought, with photos of such a treat, you could really lure people in :-( The broker was an idiot in this case and was unreachable for a whole week – that’s when we put the property on our watchlist, successfully identified it, and contacted the landlord directly. I’d say, he wasn’t pleased.

Nah, but I’ve now found it through a "weltweite Suche," I’ll freely quote that: "Tipps wo der Barthel den Most holt" It’s really a pain searching in winter... in summer we could get involved in the local sports clubs. But that’s pointless now just because of Corona.