When dealing with inexperienced, nervous and cautious buyers estate agents will, time-and-again, come across cases of buyer’s remorse, says Lanice Steward of Anne Porter Knight Frank.

“A day or two after signing or a day or two after moving in buyers may begin to question their own wisdom and to doubt themselves. Buying a property is an emotional experience which often results in a large dose of “buyer’s remorse”. This is quite common. However, a professional agent will comfort the buyer and give him back the joy he initially experienced on gaining ownership,” says Steward.

“Fortunately, all the experience shows that the regret is almost invariably short lived – in the case of property within a week or two of moving in the buyer begins to realise he has in fact done something rather clever and a new mood takes over.”

What particularly exacerbates these negative reactions, says Steward, is the sorry state in which some sellers feel entitled to leave their homes.

“Moving into a bare home can be a daunting experience,” she says. “The rooms look bare and ugly and if the light fittings have been taken they can be positively prison-like. If the rooms are not spotlessly clean, if rubble and debris have been left in the garden, if the plants have been allowed to die and the swimming pool to go black the buyer may well feel cheated.

“Good agents will do all in their power to prevent the house being left in an unsightly condition – but often by the time the buyer moves the agent and seller will have lost contact. There have occasionally been attempts to make agents pay for clean ups. This is obviously out of the question – it is definitely not our responsibility – but good agents can occasionally extract clean up contributions from sellers, particularly if their service to those seller has been good.”