Some Icelandic estate agents have started putting clauses in house purchase contracts so that buyers have to pay sellers extra interest due to the lawyers’ strike at district commissioners’ offices around the country.
The chairman of the Association of Estate Agents told RÚV that the clauses are not being added to contracts with the approval of the Association.
The lawyers’ strike has been going on for three weeks. During the strike no property loans can be approved by banks and more than 4,200 property contracts are awaiting official registration. Some estate agents have tried to find their own solution in the meantime.
Some of them have added to new contracts that if payment arrives later than ten days after the purchase contract is signed, then the buyer must pay the seller interest at the rate of a standard non-indexed loan, which is currently about six percent.
Ingibjörg Þórðardóttir, chairman of the Association of Estate Agents, says that this is not a solution that the Association has given its blessing to, but has assembled a committee charged with finding an acceptable solution to the temporary problem caused by the strike. That committee meets today.
