How to buy a house...

garak112 · 9 Jul 2013 at 07:31

Right, this is going to sound stupid but I'm getting stressed about it. How do I actually go about buying a house?

I have put an offer in and it has been accepted, the vendor has instructed solicitors. The EA told me that next is for me to instruct solicitors and said they would send a quote (they waited all day and then it was £800 higher than the average).

I am hoping to appoint my solicitor today and I am assuming that when thats done I can put my mortgage application in? What do I do after that?

mjd · 9 Jul 2013 at 07:50

Have you had an agreement in principle with a mortgage lender?
If you haven't got this yet, I would hold off on the solicitor.

Yaayuh! · 9 Jul 2013 at 08:14

As already stated. Go and get a mortgage in principle for the amount equal to what is accepted first then go and appoint a solicitor with said mortgage in principle.

A mortgage in principle is basically the first stage of your mortgage, the lender confirms that they are willing to lend you the amount required for the purchase of the house based on your income and budgets. It then carries on from there and applied for properly once the purchase is underway with your solicitor.

Do not apply for multiple mortgage in principles at once.

thewanted · 9 Jul 2013 at 08:19

Rossi~ said:
As already stated. Go and get a mortgage in principle for the amount equal to what is accepted first then go and appoint a solicitor with said mortgage in principle.

A mortgage in principle is basically the first stage of your mortgage, the lender confirms that they are willing to lend you the amount required for the purchase of the house based on your income and budgets. It then carries on from there and applied for properly once the purchase is underway with your solicitor.

Do not apply for multiple mortgage in principles at once.

I'm not the OP, but I've been wondering about this for a while.

Is it best to start with the bank that your salary is paid into? Or should I look for a lender with the lowest rates even if I've never dealt with them in the past?

garak112 · 9 Jul 2013 at 08:26

My mortgage advisor said I didn't need an AiP, although I have had one in the past, and he would just sort out the mortgage when we needed it.

Do I need one to instruct a solicitor?

Yaayuh! · 9 Jul 2013 at 08:41

thewanted said:
I'm not the OP, but I've been wondering about this for a while.

Is it best to start with the bank that your salary is paid into? Or should I look for a lender with the lowest rates even if I've never dealt with them in the past?

Generally yes, but only for convenience as the bank can easily access your cashflow. Though always shop around for the best rates!

garak112 said:
My mortgage advisor said I didn't need an AiP, although I have had one in the past, and he would just sort out the mortgage when we needed it.

Do I need one to instruct a solicitor?

Some may want it but the mortgage in principle is basically for the seller. Generally you would put in an offer, get it accepted then provide the mortgage in principle and then they take it off the market for you because you've proved that you can actually afford to buy and are serious.

Woogie · 9 Jul 2013 at 08:44

Id ignore the Mortgage advisor and go get a Mortgage in principal, a lot of sellers take you more seriously if you have it in place as theres no chance you will put the offer in then get turned down therefore wasting everyone's time.

The way I did mine with my gf was

1) Budget.... Work out what you can afford to pay monthly comfortably.. I.E if your interest rate shoots up after your fixed term can you afford to pay the extra? We doubled our interest rate and then cried at what it would be at 12% http://www.bbc.co.uk/homes/property/mortgagecalculator.shtml

2) Go to multiple banks/Building society's/Mortgage advisors and see what the best offer we could get was and then get the mortgage in pricipal from them.

3) Go house hunting and put the offer in on the one you want.

4) Once this has been accepted, Instruct our solicitor to begin with the purchase

5) Call estate agents and solicitors constantly to ensure they are actually doing their job

6) 2-6 months later Enjoy new home and all the associated stress that comes along with it

ci_newman · 9 Jul 2013 at 09:40

Definately get an AiP before appointing a solicitor. Many mortgage lenders will give you one within 24 hours anyway.

What deposit / LTV are you looking at? House value?

[DOD]Asprilla · 9 Jul 2013 at 09:42

Woogie said:
Id ignore the Mortgage advisor and go get a Mortgage in principal, a lot of sellers take you more seriously if you have it in place as theres no chance you will put the offer in then get turned down therefore wasting everyone's time.

The offer has been accepted and the vendor has instructed solicitors so I think they are taking him seriously.

OP, you've get an AiP as the initial part of the full mortgage application anyway - essentially it's just the mortgage provider saying 'based on your income and expenditure and the cost of the house it's worth us processing your full application'.

James · 9 Jul 2013 at 10:11

Hi Garak,

I'm an estate agent so should be able to help!
You need to instruct a solicitor to handle the sale of the house for you.
My advice to you would be to NOT go with the estate agents recommendation as generally they are over inflated priced call centre outfits which can be an absolute nightmare getting hold of someone!

- Instruct a good local conveyancer who specialises in property transactions they will be the most cost effective and pro active on working on your behalf.

- Make an appointment to see your mortgage advisor (I assume an Independent outfit?) to sign up and pay your survey fee. I'd personally recommend you getting a hom******s survey on the house as the initial valuation isn't as thorough. Although do take note that surveyors are expert backside coverers and may make out something to be worse than it is so there's no comeback on them!

The solicitors should be able to guide you through the rest of the process!
If there's anything else you would like to ask then I'm happy to help when I get a moment!

garak112 · 9 Jul 2013 at 13:44

Spoke with my mortgage advisor and he recommended an HSBC product which we submitted an online application for. Now we play the waiting game...

James · 9 Jul 2013 at 14:06

Be aware with HSBC they are very strict on who they allow you to use on the conveyancing side of things.

valve90210 · 9 Jul 2013 at 14:11

No, No, No speaking as a recent house seller...the last thing the seller wants is someone to play the waiting game!

You really need to be proactive when buy (or selling) a house, if you don't keep on chasing things just don't keep moving!

My advice:

Get a decent firm to do the conveyancing - we used two different firms one for buying and one for the selling. The people we used for the buying process were amazing, everything was dealt with swiftly and efficiently, as soon as anything came in to them theey went through it, picked out anything important that we should double check and wrote a covering letter to go along with our copies and posted out to us the same day.

The firm we were selling through were a total nightmare, they took ages to send anything through, and they were not particularly thorough and they made sloppy mistakes - for example I needed a copy of a form we had previously sent them, then scanned a copy and sent it through to me the next day...and I discovered it only had the odd numbered pages...the original had been double sided and they had scanned single sided...which wasted another day!

Take everything the estate agent says with a huge pinch of salt!
In my experience (no offence intended to any EAs here) they have a culture of misinformation/outright lying and will say anything to appease you even if there is no basis in fact! Keep on their backs or again nothing will get done. I lost count of the number of times I was lucky enough to have called just as they were about to do 'x' which I was calling about...amazing that!

Be prompt and accurate in everything you need to fill in and return:
The buyer that was purchasing our flat got all his forms from the conveyancer and didn't fill them in for three weeks or more as "he didn't realise they needed to be returned" the conveyancers despite having got the cheque didn't think to chase him up at all...so nothing happened from his end for that whole time.

Apart from that, good luck with it all, it can be very stressful but at the same time very exciting!!!

garak112 · 9 Jul 2013 at 14:18

James said:
Be aware with HSBC they are very strict on who they allow you to use on the conveyancing side of things.

That's why i haven't appointed a conveyancer, I am expecting them to,tell me who to use.

Kimi · 9 Jul 2013 at 14:21

Selling my house at the minute, im planning to sell up, get the money in the bank then firestorm attack the next seller with everything in order to proceed asap

Gooner14 · 9 Jul 2013 at 14:38

James said:
Be aware with HSBC they are very strict on who they allow you to use on the conveyancing side of things.

No really true anymore. For a while you had to use a certain conveyancing firm (Countrywide), HSBC realised how difficult this became to manage, so as long as the you are looking to use are CQS Accredited Solicitors you'll be fine. You can use a non accredited firm if you wish, but you'll have to pay HSBC's fee's too.

James · 9 Jul 2013 at 14:52

valve90210 said:
My advice:

Get a decent firm to do the conveyancing

Take everything the estate agent says with a huge pinch of salt!
In my experience (no offence intended to any EAs here) they have a culture of misinformation/outright lying and will say anything to appease you even if there is no basis in fact! Keep on their backs or again nothing will get done. I lost count of the number of times I was lucky enough to have called just as they were about to do 'x' which I was calling about...amazing that!

Be prompt and accurate in everything you need to fill in and return:

RE: The pinch of salt comment, as an EA I have to agree.
In my personal experience 9/10 Estate Agents are idiots, sales people not property professionals.

I think valve has offered you sound advice to follow there and would back up everything they've said.

RE: Gooner - I didn't realise that'd changed, it must have been recent I haven't (Thankfully) had to deal with a HSBC mortgage lately! But thank you for the info! :cool:

physichull · 10 Jul 2013 at 07:29

Having good solicitors on both sides is a huge bonus. My solicitor was excellent and informed me of everything that was going on in writing. He was readily available to talk to on the phone and practically walked me through the whole process. I'd suggest a solicitor that is local to your area also. I barely even spoke to the Estate Agents after idi had my offer accepted. The only real contact we had with them was to arrange keys and when they told us the dishwasher had broken!