Ask a settlement agent: how selling in WA really works

“The biggest difference is that the disclosures come after the contract. In Victoria, everything is attached to the contract up front. In some states the buyer even gets the building inspection before signing, and the seller offers up a lot more. In WA, the contract is between the seller and the buyer, and then the buyer goes to all the relevant departments and gets the certificates.

“It becomes the buyer’s responsibility to do their own due diligence on the property. The seller still has to provide material information, but it’s limited. Perth buyers won’t know any different. East coast investors will find it confusing.

“There’s no cooling-off period, and there’s no contract review period. If you’re used to buying in Melbourne or Sydney, you’ll feel like something is missing.”

“It’s exactly the same job. The legislation here was the Settlement Agents Act when it was set up in 1981, so settlement agent is the WA term. More people say conveyancer now, the same way vendor became seller. It’s a language change.

“If someone asks what I do, I say I’m a settlement agent. If I say conveyancer, people confuse it with valuer, and then they ask me what their house is worth. No one knows what we do.”

“The property is marketed and buyers register interest. The seller picks who they want to deal with, usually the buyer with finance in place who isn’t selling anything. Then you complete the offer and acceptance form with the seller’s and buyer’s details. Strata properties have a pre-contract strata disclosure.

“Around 85 per cent of contracts just have a building report, a termite report and a good working order clause. That’s it. Then there’s back and forth on price: no, we want 720, how about 730. Once it’s signed, it’s executed.”

“There’s no 10 per cent in WA. You’ll see contracts with a deposit of $1,000 on a $900,000 sale. It’s terrible, but nobody really cares.”

“I’m a firm believer that a good settlement is a quick settlement. If you’ve got a good team, extra time is just wasted. We say to agents and clients: do 10 and 10. Unless there’s a real reason, like the family needs to move before school starts, keep it tight.

“The more you drag it out, the more time people have to wonder whether they made the right decision. They start getting opinions. It’s much easier to ask for an extension than to have a client start to wander off. And if I’ve got 30 days, day 28 is when it’s on my radar. Most people work that way.”

“The finance clause stays on foot. It doesn’t lapse on the date. It just continues until someone pulls the pin: the seller says you’ve had an extra 10 days, I’m terminating, or the buyer says I’ve got approval. You don’t need formal extensions.

“You’ll feel it. Finance is due tomorrow, the buyer says they need a couple more days, and everyone says that’s fine. It feels relaxed, but it isn’t. It’s built into the contract.”

“Yes. We want things to settle. You want it to settle, I want it to settle. A lot of effort goes into getting a contract signed. You don’t want a buyer going in thinking they’ve got a way out.

“If you have a finance clause and a deposit, the contract already covers it. A buyer who has genuinely changed their mind can usually get a letter from their bank or broker saying they can’t get finance. The finance clause ends up working like a cooling-off period anyway.”

“If something isn’t compliant, like unapproved work, in WA that’s treated as a warranty from the seller, not a special condition. There’s a process in the general conditions, but the buyer can’t hold up settlement. If you use the standard REIWA contracts and sell by private treaty, it’s very unusual for a deal not to settle.”

“Heaps. Especially out in the Wheatbelt. Farmers and neighbours have always dealt with each other directly. Maybe we’re more trusting. Maybe we just don’t want to pay real estate agents.

“Landlords selling to their tenants is very common too. I’ve got one at the moment: a national transport company bought rentals for staff in towns where you can’t find accommodation, and it’s now selling one to a driver. He can’t come up with the money, and it has dragged on and on.”

“It usually comes down to miscommunication. The buyer feels their expectations weren’t met, but they haven’t done their own due diligence. Then a third party asks, didn’t the seller tell you that? The settlement agent ends up stuck in the middle, being asked for information that isn’t theirs to give.

“It only takes one party being difficult for the whole deal to become a horrible experience for everybody. When everyone on the deal hears the same message, a difficult buyer or seller gets told the same thing: that’s not in the contract, it’s not a problem, and what the team told you is right. We’re all here for the same result. We’re not getting bogged down on rusty gutters.”

“Sellers signed up, and then they had nothing. Absolutely nothing. They’d call a conveyancer for a quote and say, I’ve sold it myself, expecting us to fill out everything. That’s why those models failed in WA so quickly.”