The nervous wait to exchange....

[cuke2u]

We've just exchanged yesterday after commencing the legal processes of buying and selling in March. The chain isn't big, we're not requiring a mortgage to purchase and neither are the sellers of the house we're purchasing and the house they're buying the owner is deceased, thus their immediate family wanted rid of it as soon as possible.
The buyers of our property don't have a property they need to sell either but just had to confirm they were able to obtain a mortgage, thus you'd think it would have been quick and simple.
However, for some reason known only to them, they went with a solicitor based hundreds of miles from where they're living, and presumably not one recommended by their mortgage broker or by the estate agents.
I think the lack of 'local knowledge' of the solicitor may have contributed to extending the process and placing certain conditions upon us, at an increased cost also.
However we now have a moving date that we're all in agreement with now and this is a relief as we were packed and ready to go last month when a earlier date was proposed then, eventually, delayed

 

[Dup]

We offered on the 15th May and are looking to complete 17th August. No chain either side (we rent, the seller is buying an already vacant property) but 3 months has felt like a lifetime, especially as we're desperate to get out of the terraced shed we're cooped up in now. It doesn't feel great that the solicitors seemingly silently gatekeep most of the process but we're looking at the finish line now.

I just need concrete dates so I can hire a van and get us in. My biggest worry is broadband as I work from home and they're bound to make it harder than it needs to be. While we have overlap with our tenancy, there's no way given the option I'm staying any longer in this place than I need to

 

[Tony Edwards]

We offered on the 15th May and are looking to complete 17th August. No chain either side (we rent, the seller is buying an already vacant property) but 3 months has felt like a lifetime, especially as we're desperate to get out of the terraced shed we're cooped up in now. It doesn't feel great that the solicitors seemingly silently gatekeep most of the process but we're looking at the finish line now.

I just need concrete dates so I can hire a van and get us in. My biggest worry is broadband as I work from home and they're bound to make it harder than it needs to be. While we have overlap with our tenancy, there's no way given the option I'm staying any longer in this place than I need to

Im fairly sure BB will take two weeks minimum.

 

[Martynt74]

We offered on the 15th May and are looking to complete 17th August. No chain either side (we rent, the seller is buying an already vacant property) but 3 months has felt like a lifetime, especially as we're desperate to get out of the terraced shed we're cooped up in now. It doesn't feel great that the solicitors seemingly silently gatekeep most of the process but we're looking at the finish line now.

I just need concrete dates so I can hire a van and get us in. My biggest worry is broadband as I work from home and they're bound to make it harder than it needs to be. While we have overlap with our tenancy, there's no way given the option I'm staying any longer in this place than I need to

I've got a van if you struggled.

 

[nst68]

House has been on the market for a week now, no viewings yet

We went to visit the new development we want to buy in, there's now only 1 house they've released for sale that we'd be interested in and they can't/won't say when the next ones of the styles we like will be released.

So part of me is glad we haven't had any viewers!

 

[LuckyBenski]

Im fairly sure BB will take two weeks minimum.

I set up ours to be delivered on the day of exchange, found it on the doorstep when we arrived. They'd delivered it a day early on Good Friday!

Helps our property was vacant before completion so it wasn't too shady to set up the VM contract before we owned the house...

 

[Dup]

Im fairly sure BB will take two weeks minimum.
I've got a van if you struggled.

I set up ours to be delivered on the day of exchange, found it on the doorstep when we arrived. They'd delivered it a day early on Good Friday!

Helps our property was vacant before completion so it wasn't too shady to set up the VM contract before we owned the house...

I hope not. I'll have to go to my mums, or worse, the office. Work without my full screen and keyboard would be interesting, I'm so used to an Ultrawide.

Still not official date yet so far today. Hopefully we'll know soon but potentially less than one weeks notice will make the process interesting. We could just wait but my understanding is they'll cut us off here and we'll have to wait for connection at the other end. Also going from FTTP to FTTC so I'm sure they'll find a way of screwing it up (ground work for FTTP has been done, hopefully they come back to roll it out soon).

I've got a van if you struggled.

Nice one, thanks. Got a few local hire options that are currently available. We might just go man with a van yet as it's only for the bigger stuff and it might save some arguments Got a Mondeo Estate for the rest. Was just gonna hire a van for the day and do as much as possible as it's cheaper.

 

[Martynt74]

Nice one, thanks. Got a few local hire options that are currently available. We might just go man with a van yet as it's only for the bigger stuff and it might save some arguments Got a Mondeo Estate for the rest. Was just gonna hire a van for the day and do as much as possible as it's cheaper.

I keep joking i'm goin to branch out to Man with a Van work. Give me a shout when you've got a quote and i'll see if it's worth it

With Broadband. How decent a connection do you need? I've used a hotspot from my phone for the odd office work, but i guess it depends what's involved

 

[doodah]

Any advice with mortgage and life insurance? Just got sent through some initial quotes and they range from £130-330pm. Not a ******* chance, never heard people pay those sort of prices.

Edit - think I'll be looking up some of our own quotes.

 

[nst68]

No viewings on my house after 2 weeks

but just accepted an offer on my parents home , it's only been on the market for 10 days!!

 

[Kamakazie!]

Well ours has taken a sudden turn. Our sale and Purchase has been going on since Feb/March. No major anomalies just our buyers and who we are purchasing from taking an age to do anything. Anyway, last week our buyers threatened to pull out of purchasing our house, so we have had to agree to complete on the 24th Aug and Exchanged contracts on our sale today. Our onwards purchase are 'Aiming' to be ready to Complete on the 1st September but we are yet to Exchange contract.

Slightly worrying situation but I don't want to risk having to go back on the Market again... Prices have dropped since we sold and the Mortgage rates are terrible so we could end up waiting for ages to find a buyer and also lose the house we want to purchase. I've got a young family so this is a bit un-settling, but I'm not sure what else I could have done. I have been and continue to chase the Estate agents of my onwards purchase most days (they rarely return calls, etc). To be fair to my Estate Agents and my Solicitor (both local) they have been excellent, no complaints with them at all.

Now looking into storage of our possessions and somewhere temporarily to live. Blooming nightmare! Anyone else been in this situation?

A bit late now but I'd have used it to pressure up the chain and do the same to them. Worst case is your purchase falls through and you are stuck renting for months or you pay to get out of your sale.
Neither sounds good, but is the risk of not exchanging simultaneously.

Hopefully it's gone well though!

 

[Kamakazie!]

Any advice with mortgage and life insurance? Just got sent through some initial quotes and they range from £130-330pm. Not a ******* chance, never heard people pay those sort of prices.

Edit - think I'll be looking up some of our own quotes.

Do you need it? It's not usually a mandatory requirement on mortgages these days.

 

[gazref]

No viewings on my house after 2 weeks

but just accepted an offer on my parents home , it's only been on the market for 10 days!!

Area thing or was one priced bit fairer ?

 

[Joe Jones]

Any advice with mortgage and life insurance? Just got sent through some initial quotes and they range from £130-330pm. Not a ******* chance, never heard people pay those sort of prices.

Edit - think I'll be looking up some of our own quotes.

Depends on how much you need to cover, age, and consideration for what happens should you expire early.

I have £240K flat cover from many years ago that costs £12/month. Re-quoting is more like £19/month.
Recently had a mortgage application and entertained the banks looking for life insurance quotes with critical cover coming in at £40-50/month and deferred income protection (2K per month after 12 months) was another £40-50/month. Told them it was way overpriced and would be better off just paying down the mortgage with that difference.

 

[Itchytrigg]

MIL house now reduced by 25k. Had little interest sadly except one offer of about 55k under asking which was rejected.

How much changes in a year and a half compared to when we were buying.

 

[Joe Jones]

The markets are weird.

Where I am anything at the lower end (<£300K) is getting bought pretty quick if it's in good condition. The middle ground of £350K-£600K is really slow. Then we have period properties at £700K+ which sell in a week and two recently came up with the second being more expensive for mostly the same thing.
We also have £1mil+ that just aren't moving at all but I think that's a different market to itself in the greater area.

People don't want to fix up anything, so if feasible give things a redecorate and it should sell in time.

Also saw a house come on the market again. Sold last year, owners completed at start of Jan, now it's on the market for £35K more than what they paid....I'm guessing they're overpricing with the expectation of being knocked down so they can protect what they paid for it 8 months ago.

 

[gazref]

I'm looking to buy and Ive seen a number of doer upper houses too far over priced that I wonder if they'll sell. Not been touched for close to half a century since, in need of fully overhauling to the tune of 60-80k easily yet sellers have them listed at the upper end of what it might achieve if it was modernised and the market hadn't dipped 7-10%. Hard to even open a negotiation when they're starting 20% over

 

[koolpc]

People push for as much as they can get. Plus EA's dont help by inflating prices well beyond their true value.

 

[mattyfez]

There doesn't seem to be any reductions in prices in my area for FTB/starter homes, i.e. sub £200k, aside from ones that were obviously overpriced in the first instance.

 

[mattpj]

I've had 3 agents round so far, valuations were
1. £525k, accept £500k
2. £520k
3. £425k

I know the market is in a slump, but £100k difference?

if they are a good agent they may be pricing at £425k to get competing buying which in turn will for sure get you the best price.

If your house is worth £500k in this market then the best way to find out is to list under that and get competing offers.

The market is getting worse in general (your locale may be doing better/worse) so get viewings fast and get it sold if you need to sell.

EDIT: sorry for the extremely late bump on this topic