Well after we were gazumped by Esprit Homes scoring an own goal, we decided to email them with a letter of complaint about the way we have been treated…..

The managing director responded by telephone to give his side of the story. He apologised for all the confusion, but had to agree that the situation was less than ideal. He says that the people who are now buying the house we wanted had the advantage, because they have no house to sell, whereas we were wanting to part-ex ours. He also said that they viewed the house and expressed an interest before we did, therefore gaining the advantage in the queue. But in that case, why did the company take our cheque for £1000 to reserve the plot, and then not tell us that anyone else was interested? It was a full five days later that we were told that we had lost out to another couple. By then we had instructed solicitors, and spend a lot of time and effort gathering the necessary paperwork etc in preparation.

The managing director promised to look into things to see if he could do a deal with us on another house which is similar but not quite as good for what we need. He promised to ring us again on Weds evening. Weds evening came and went, as did Thurs and Fri with no contact. Later on Friday we emailed him again to ask what was happening. We also informed him that we had been approached by the Sunday Telegraph ‘Property Nightmares’ section, who had heard about our dilemma and who thought that ours was a suitable nightmare worthy of press coverage.

We then received a curt email reply saying he would be in touch over the weekend. We are waiting with baited breath before we go back to the newspaper to give our story.