Under no circumstances sell your business with Hilton Smythe. We made the unfortunate decision to sign a six month contract with them back in February this year to sell our shop. A valuer visited us and told us that if we paid so much upfront, they'd be no more fee's to pay and if the shop wasn't sold within six months we could simply pull it off the market or go with someone else. It was originally marketed and valued at £50,000.
Initially we had a lot of interest and a sale looked likely. Then lockdown happened three weeks into the shop being advertised and all went quiet until late July, early August. Barely anything from Hilton Smythe. This we had expected due to the circumstances. In the meantime, the shop has been open and trading extremely well. Then come early August, we start being messed around by the agent. Suddenly and without any warning another agent has taken over and is arranging viewings with people who are not properly vetted. We're let down at the last minute by people who don't show up. We then reduce the price of our business in an effort to sell quicker, even then the agents kept calling with offer's well below the new asking price and when we turned them all down, we were made to feel like we're the ones being unreasonable and as though we should just accept any offer.
Low and behold, we have decided to take our business off the market. Our contract ran out on August 2nd, therefore we are now out of contract. But... Hilton Smythe have stated that we have to give them six weeks notice for them to take our business off the market and in this time, we must accept viewings else we are liable for a fee of almost £3,000! We only received an actual copy of our contract, the day we gave Hilton Smythe our notice, which was two days ago. Yesterday, emails were flying back and forth between Myself and the agency over yet another no show.
Hilton Smythe have become bullies and will stoop to any depths. They're not on the sellers side, the very people paying them and they will send anyone, unvetted, to waste your time on the promise of a sale. No matter how hard you try to get out of it, they will use 'the contract' against you. Do expect a level of stress that will drive you to the brink of a nervous breakdown and if you have a decent business, expect it to be adversely affected by bogus buyers phoning them and then you being forced into showing such people around! I urge anyone thinking of selling a business, go elsewhere. I wish I had seen some of these reviews back in February.... Read more
324 days ago