The nervous wait to exchange....

[mid_gen]

Survey back, chimney needs a little repointing work and some files on the roof tidied up by nothing serious.

I'm getting quite nervous about covid-19 throwing a spanner in the works, so desperate to get completed by the end of this month.

 

[MrKnifey]

Put an offer in on a detached bungalow with double garage and a load of space around it last night.. hopefully hear back today!

 

[MrKnifey]

Put an offer in on a detached bungalow with double garage and a load of space around it last night.. hopefully hear back today!

Offer accepted

 

[rhysduck]

Offer accepted

Nice you moving far dude?

 

[MrKnifey]

Nice you moving far dude?

Back to Pontypridd buddy.

 

[byeo]

Received an email alert regarding a property I may be interested in Friday evening, ticks all our boxes, 3 bed-semi, driveway, quiet area, freehold, chain free. Viewed it Saturday morning, second viewing with parents Sunday morning, stuck an offer in Sunday afternoon, hoping to hear from the vendor today.

 

[mid_gen]

Still waiting on a quote to get chimney repointed but not going to quibble on the price. Just sorting out completion and exchange date...nearly there...

 

[byeo]

Received an email alert regarding a property I may be interested in Friday evening, ticks all our boxes, 3 bed-semi, driveway, quiet area, freehold, chain free. Viewed it Saturday morning, second viewing with parents Sunday morning, stuck an offer in Sunday afternoon, hoping to hear from the vendor today.

Vendor got back to me, they've got 7 people interested now so are waiting to see what comes out of it. Let the games begin..

 

[Orionaut]

9 days off now,

Might the great plague of 2020 cause me issues within this timeframe?

For me, the cash is in place, on completion I will have somewhere in the middle of nowhere to hole up with no outstanding debts or loans to worry about.

(And a load of supplies, not just food but generator, 500l fuel, and so on (Not to mention the 2000L fuel and 3 tons of wood/coal that comes with the house) )

But at this stage could the person I am buying from still cause a problem? (Contracts already exchanged)

 

[sanaxe1]

Nvm.

 

[flea.rider]

still waiting on a grant of probate ..from december grrr ..
emailed the bank to see if they would let it go ahead not heard anything back yet

 

[mid_gen]

9 days off now,

Might the great plague of 2020 cause me issues within this timeframe?

For me, the cash is in place, on completion I will have somewhere in the middle of nowhere to hole up with no outstanding debts or loans to worry about.

(And a load of supplies, not just food but generator, 500l fuel, and so on (Not to mention the 2000L fuel and 3 tons of wood/coal that comes with the house) )

But at this stage could the person I am buying from still cause a problem? (Contracts already exchanged)

Check the Standard Conditions of Sale terms, to my untrained eye it seems that the seller can still pull out with little penalty after exchange.

Seller's failure to comply with notice to complete 7.5.1 If the seller fails to complete in accordance with a notice to complete, the following terms apply. 7.5.2 The buyer may rescind the contract, and if he does so: (a) the deposit is to be repaid to the buyer with accrued interest (b) the buyer is to return any documents he received from the seller and is, at the seller's expense, to cancel any registration of the contract

Hoping to exchange this week or next, with 31st March completion...although I kinda with I had pushed it forward a bit....super paranoid about someone getting sick before completion....would have to be pretty unlucky at this stage, but still.

 

[jaybee]

@jaybee have a look at the process online so you know what’s coming. It’s differs in Scotland if you are buying there.

Try not to get all wrapped up ‘in the moment’, it’s easy to get over excited and miss important things when viewing a property (e.g. the age/condition of expensive fittings like bathrooms, kitchens doors, windows and boilers) which are expensive to change. Also keep an eye out for little things which are very useful but very hard to retrofit such as power in the garage which is easy to miss and a complete PITA without.

Do a few drive-bys at different time’s of the day so you can get a feel for parking, noise and traffic.

Apply a healthy amount of scepticism to anything anyone tells you who are not specifically working for you, that especially includes estate agents and the person you are buying from and their solicitor.

Any party in the chain can be a pain, including your own solicitor. People say get a local one, I disagree, it doesn’t matter if they are local, you shouldn’t ever need to meet them. All that matters is they are competent. A good solicitor will make the purchase very easy.

Read all paper work very carefully, make sure it matches what you have been told verbally. Once you have exchanged it’s costly to change your mind.

Honestly the first bit of advice I can give is that it's really not that bad, you'll need to have a good handle on your finances, and be reasonably organised with things, but don't stress too much over it.

Speak to a broker to work out what you can afford, they will give you an idea of that based on your income, outgoings, deposit, debts etc. Be honest on all points because banks have checks for things like money-laundering, and eventually you'd have credit checks against you.

London & Country are fee-free, which means you don't pay anything to the broker, they get a cut on any successful mortgages from the bank. https://www.landc.co.uk/. Feel free to find your own, but no harm in talking to someone like them.

What you will want is an agreement in principle, this will be a letter/form from a bank that shows intent to lend you the money in the price range you are looking at.

You should then book some viewings to go look at houses once you know what you can afford in your area.

Once you find a house and you have an offer down, then you'll need to instruct a conveyancing solicitor to handle the purchase. You'll want to get a handle on the situation in your chain as well.

If buying a new build, then negotiate a discount on the RRP because they will rip you off.

Thanks for the encouragement guys.

Well update....things took a turn and have suddenly accelerated massively. We've had an offer accepted on a house so I've basically been trying to understand next steps. Agent is predicting about a 2-3 month exchange time based on the chain currently. I've had a couple of solicitors quotes and they are coming in between £1500 - £2000 for all the legal fees, search fees, bank chaps fee, land fee etc etc. Obviously then there's about £5000 in stamp. Do any of these solicitor's do a thing where you pay a fee for protection of if it all collapses last minute and you've already spent hundreds in fees?

Then there's obviously the mortgage.... I've seen today that the BOE have slashed interest rates to try to help economy with Corona so it sounds like at least a good time to buy a mortgage product. We are first time buyers putting down a 10% deposit. My questions are:

1: As a first time buyer with the intention to stay in this house for at least 5 years, possibly even 10.... do you think we should fix for 10 or is it just too inflexible and risky?
2: How long will it take for the new mortgage rates to become live with the new rate cut?
3: What sort of rates should I be expecting to be able to get as first time buyers with 10% LTV. (The mortgage will be ridiculously large and probably 30 year term ) but hey.

Also, do you think house prices will go down over the next year? We did think about trying to buy the dip in perhaps a years time, but my concern would be that people are quite stubborn with housing prices and simply won't want to sell, and will wait for recovery so it will become hard to find decent housing (apart from new builds).

We are moving in with parents temporarily to also raise a few months worth of cash to help with this. The whole thing feels like a massive stretch and commitment but it also feels like the right thing to do. I've paid other peoples mortgages for 20 years nearly. Time to start paying my own.

 

[mid_gen]

Unlikely house prices are going to drop now that interest rates are back at zero again....even if this virus does mean an increase in property coming on the market (a bit dark, but realistic).

 

[HungryHippos]

Thanks for the encouragement guys.

Well update....things took a turn and have suddenly accelerated massively. We've had an offer accepted on a house so I've basically been trying to understand next steps. Agent is predicting about a 2-3 month exchange time based on the chain currently. I've had a couple of solicitors quotes and they are coming in between £1500 - £2000 for all the legal fees, search fees, bank chaps fee, land fee etc etc. Obviously then there's about £5000 in stamp. Do any of these solicitor's do a thing where you pay a fee for protection of if it all collapses last minute and you've already spent hundreds in fees?

Then there's obviously the mortgage.... I've seen today that the BOE have slashed interest rates to try to help economy with Corona so it sounds like at least a good time to buy a mortgage product. We are first time buyers putting down a 10% deposit. My questions are:

1: As a first time buyer with the intention to stay in this house for at least 5 years, possibly even 10.... do you think we should fix for 10 or is it just too inflexible and risky?
2: How long will it take for the new mortgage rates to become live with the new rate cut?
3: What sort of rates should I be expecting to be able to get as first time buyers with 10% LTV. (The mortgage will be ridiculously large and probably 30 year term ) but hey.

Also, do you think house prices will go down over the next year? We did think about trying to buy the dip in perhaps a years time, but my concern would be that people are quite stubborn with housing prices and simply won't want to sell, and will wait for recovery so it will become hard to find decent housing (apart from new builds).

We are moving in with parents temporarily to also raise a few months worth of cash to help with this. The whole thing feels like a massive stretch and commitment but it also feels like the right thing to do. I've paid other peoples mortgages for 20 years nearly. Time to start paying my own.

As a FTB your stamp duty should be either free, or very low, certainly I would not expect £5K but depends what you are buying and where. Looks like it's free under £300K properties (£500K in London) as long as all buying parties are FTB's.

BOE slashed interest rates, but could be a little delayed in finding the savings filtering down to mortgage products, doesn't usually occur on day one of an interest rate change.

In answer to your questions:

1: Fixing for longer generally costs more each month, but depends on your risk appetite. I would say fix for 2 years, 5 years, or 10 years. 3 years seems a bit of a pointless middle ground. Fix for 2 years if you think interest rates aren't going anywhere fast, if you are worried about them going up then fix for 5 years is probably best. 10 years you could be stuck in a long term expensive fix compared to doing (5 x 2 years) or (2 x 5 year) fixes in the same time frame. Also bear in mind that each time you remortgage, your current equity % and the house value is taken into account, so if you pay more of the house off in a few years you can bag a better mortgage rate by having a higher equity % on a remortgage.
1A: Don't overlook trackers short term, I am on a tracker with Nationwide at the moment for 2 years, with no product fee, base rate +1.09% (so effectively just dropped to 1.34%). The tracker with Nationwide has the benefit of not having an ERC (Early Repayment Charge) so I can leave it whenever I want to without any real penalty. Trackers are generally considered riskier though, also interest rates are unlikely to track downwards further than they have already. Main other benefit would be unlimited over payments on trackers generally.
1B: Beware of product fees, these can range from £500 - £2K, and are fixed costs. Often mortgages with product fees have a lower % rate monthly, but the fee can be punishing. The mortgages without product fees have higher % rates, but they don't have a fee attached. The general rule of thumb is that when borrowing above say £200K~, the ones with product fees start to become worth considering, that can be worked out on a case by case basis though. Always add product fees to the mortgage, because then if all falls through you don't have to pay it.
1C: Some lenders offer cashback or free legal incentives, this will reduce the initial cost of the mortgage so worth considering. If you are buying an older home then do consider getting a better level of survey than just a valuation (Level 1). Home buyers survey (Level 2) should cover most reasonably new properties. If buying an older house then do consider a structural survey (Level 3). Costs ramp up with each survey level, but Level 3 is the only one that gives you any recourse legally speaking if the house falls down because it wasn't surveyed properly, or a structural problem was not highlighted properly.

2: I think I answered this above based on my thoughts, but speak to broker/lender about it.

3: Putting high level details into https://www.nationwide.co.uk/products/mortgages/our-mortgage-rates will give you a good idea of the kind of rates you can get. It will also advise the total paid over the term (but won't include the product fee so add that manually to the ones that have the product fee on).
3A: Consider making the term longer, this lets you have lower mandatory monthly payments. You can usually over pay mortgages so you can reduce the term by overpaying in lump sums or monthly if you so choose. Having a longer term doesn't really have any downsides as long as you manage to pay it off earlier than the original length.

Hard to predict house prices, but it's my belief I don't think they'll go rocketing up short term, too much in the air with brexit and Coronavirus. I don't want them to crash either as I am invested in my own one like a lot of people here are.

 

[silversurfer]

6% fatality would mean deflation and effect working population, business etc., I dont yet believe that worst case scenario personally. The weakest point long term imo is the value of sterling as we have a trade deficit, lower cash value from poor rates doesnt make lower house prices likely. A spike in interest rates and/or sovereign debt crisis and also recession would be lower

 

[mid_gen]

Deposit is with solicitors. Waiting on local authority checks before exchange. Has become a very nervous wait.

 

[mid_gen]

Checks back, exchange on Tuesday hopefully. I'm now working from home for the foreseeable, going to try and avoid catching it for the next month until the move is done.

 

[mid_gen]

Does anyone know what physically takes place on completion day?

Obviously keys change hands, and money...but is someone at the council involved to change the deeds etc?

 

[Skillmister]

Does anyone know what physically takes place on completion day?

Obviously keys change hands, and money...but is someone at the council involved to change the deeds etc?

Registration with the Land Registry takes places after completion to change to your name on the "deeds"

Completion is pretty much just keys and money swapping.