Waiting to Exchange - Part 2, the wait goes on!

[TokyoSushi]

Hello! New thread, I don't think there's another one yet... shall we all give a quick update regarding where we're up to?

We:

• Went on market 12th June
• Sold for full asking 6th July too good to be true
• Had an offer accepted on DH dream home, (I didn't really like it but only suitable thing on the market)
• Our buyer pulled out 6th August
• DH dream home owner wouldn't wait and put straight back on market
• We went back on market on 7th August, reduced by £5K
• 4 viewings and 4 offers in next few days
• Offer accepted on 13th august
• Found both of our actual dream home and had offer accepted on 14th August
• Our buyer seems as firm as they can be
• Mortgage offer approved and searches commissioned on new house
• Our buyers seem very, very keen but I have a slight suspicion about how firm their buyer is
• Everybody hoping to move by half term

And so we wait....

[JustLurk1ng]

Exciting!

We:

• went on the market in Jan
• offer in may
• found our dream house after a two week search and put in an offer that was accepted
• our buyer dropped out almost straight after
• went back on the market late may with a lower price and new EA
• found another buyer in June
• dream house still available - yay! Offered again and issued memorandum of sale late June
• now 9 weeks in after MoS (ish) and waiting for exchange
• hoping to complete next week

It's been a really rocky, stressful road and the end is in sight... but it could still all go wrong - we have 5 houses in the chain.

[GoldTag]

I'd been lurking on the old thread so thought I might as well jump in and join the new one to help share the frustration!

My timeline:

• 1st March, my property put on the market (1 bed flat)
  
• End of May, accepted an offer on flat. Buyer is chain free and buying flat as a second property so naively thought this would be simpler...
  
• I viewed a dream flat (2 bed, with terrace!) two days later, had a second viewing that same week and made an offer
  
• 31st May, offer accepted (yay!)
  
• June: back and forth but mortgage approved, survey arranged etc. Buyer had full survey carried out on my flat
  
• July: enquiries from my solicitor and sellers' solicitor all going well... nothing heard from buyer's solicitor, buyer came to view again
  
• August: upwards in chain we're all approaching exchange, still nothing from buyer's solicitor despite my agent and solicitor chasing...
  
• end of August: finally hear from buyer's solicitor after a ridiculous amount of chasing and find they have only just sent off for searches (!!!). Cue fury from my solicitor when she finally gets hold of them and apparently shouts at them over the phone (don't blame her!)
  

So now here we are in September still having to chase the buyer and his solicitor daily as the rest of the chain is basically ready to exchange. It's driving me insane trying to be patient and is so frustrating as the original aim was to complete mid August, but now I think end of September would be a miracle. The buyer's solicitors seem to keep passing the work off between them with nobody making any progress. One who was working on it went away then came back this week and says he is handing it to someone else as 'hopefully' they can get some enquiries sent to my solicitor this week quicker than he would be able to. Grrrrr what have you been doing for the last 3 months?! Useless.

Anyway phew, venting. Fingers crossed for everyone that things pick up pace now summer holidays are over!

[inlimboland]

Also been lurking. I feel your pain @GoldTag. All offers in our chain were accepted over 3 months ago, we've been ready to exchange for weeks but it transpires there is a load of legal work outstanding on our buyer's sale
We first went on the market nearly 2 yrs ago and I am just completely done in by this process and the continual waiting for news each week.
Fingers crossed for speedy exchanges all round.

[Kattatty87]

Can i join?

We went on the market last year but estate agent completely overpriced our flat.
Put it back on May this year- had loads od viewings and second viewings then nothing.

Dropped by 10k. Nothing

Changed agent and sold within 2 weeks!

Had our offer accepted on a house we had had our eye on for a few months, they've now bought a place and their sellers have bought a chain free property.

Everyone has instructed solicitors/ surveys etc etc so hoping our exchange date can be seen somewhere in the distance.

Our ftb are desperate to move in so hoping it all goes smoothly. Think I'll cry if we lose them

[TeamRocket]

Still here! Our situation so far:

House on the market beginning of May-had to reduce price twice as selling in the south London market and moving 200 miles away.
Offer accepted end of june, no chain either side so hoped it would go quickly.
It all did go quite quickly for a bit-until we hit the surveys. House buyers survey found damp in one of the rooms, since then everything has gone at a snails pace. Buyers have basically taken the whole of August to get quotes, decide what to do etc, and we have had to constantly chase for what is happening.

We're hoping to have exchanged by the end of the week and complete the week after, I'm not convinced though. We're moving out next week whatever happens so in an ideal world we'll have at least exchanged 🤞🏻

[BuildingThings]

Hi All!

Good idea to start a new thread!

So good that you’re now buying what’s both your and your DH’s dream home, @Tokyo! Everything happens for a reason, I hope all smooth sailing for you from now on!

Fingers crossed for exchange next week, @JustLurking and @TeamRocket!

Welcome @GoldTag! That sounds so infuriating!! I feel your pain! So frustrating when there’s only one person holding the whole sale up! It sounds like you’ve got a really good solicitor who’s got your back!

That sounds really promising, @Kattyatty87!

@inlimbo wow, 2 years!? You have the patience of a saint!

As for us;
03/08 Offer accepted. Vendor is chain free, so are we!
06/08 Solicitor’s instructed, memos sent out
17/08 Valuation Survey, all fine
20/08 Discovered vendor hasn’t instructed solicitor
22/08 Mortgage offer
23/08 Chased the EA all week regarding vendors solicitors, vendor doesn’t take phonecalls/respond to emails.
27/08 Same as above.
03/09 EA has finally got a hold of the vendor, who’s now buying, but apparently this won’t hold up the sale...

Also, apparently the vendor is trying to keep the sale hidden from her BF… So the EA can’t send her letters, emails or phone her at home…

How is she going to fill out all the forms if she can’t receive any documents in the post?

Also, she has decided that she will instruct solicitor this coming Friday (5 weeks after accepting our offer) and will go to their office to pay them and sign documents. I’ve never sold before, is this normal? Do you pay the solicitor before they do any work at all?


In the meantime, we’ve started looking at other properties again. I hate househunting…

[TriggeredByHangingBaskets]

Hello!

-Sold in June, 3 in the chain FTBsvendor of our new house. This is the 'big' move in to our forever home, I still can't get excited yet I can't believe the system works this way. We're so close to the end but everything could still fall through!
-hoping for completion on 21st Sept
-we go on holiday this Friday for a week which isn't great timing!

Good luck to everyone. Our buyers solicitors are awful and very slow.

[TriggeredByHangingBaskets]

Urgh that should say chain is FTBs-us-house we're buying.

[LIVIA999]

Hiiiiii.
I'm also here.
Put house on market a year ago- three estate agents and three price drops later we are ' hopefully ' getting close to exchange!
Maybe...
Who knows...
I think in this process until you are in you dare not breathe

[zebrapig]

Hello everyone!

Our timeline is something like this:

Aug 2017 - house goes on market, optimistically move before Christmas as new baby due in Feb
Autumn - lots of viewings, all feedback is about stuff we can't change
December - Contemplate taking house off market but decide to leave it on as market is supposed to pick up on Boxing Day. DS arrives 7 weeks early, 4 days before Christmas, have a last minute viewing whilst still in hospital!
March 2018 - approached by new agent to switch to them
April - give notice to existing agent
May - house goes on with new agent, offer accepted within 10 days. Find a house we love and have offer accepted. Vendor doesn't have an onward purchase which is perfect as the chain behind us is well developed and wants to complete in 6-8 weeks.
June - 4 weeks after we got our AIP our mortgage lender tells us they can only give us £10k less than on the AIP. Back to square one and starting again with a broker.
Mid June (6 weeks after our offer was accepted) - vendor's EA calls me to tell me she is now making an onward purchase but it's empty so shouldn't hold anything up. One week later we find out it's actually tenanted and won't be empty until start of September as tenant has only just been given notice
Start of July - lots of back and forth with our vendor's EA to see if one of us will break the chain. We have two small children and no family locally so refuse, saying it's the vendor's fault and she needs to be the one to break. EA agrees but vendor refuses so we are at stalemate.
Mid July - our buyer's buyer gets fed up of waiting and pulls out. Our house goes back on market, as does the one we're buying.
End of July - accept another offer on our house, £5k less than the original one, manage to resurrect our onward chain. Provide extra information to new mortgage lender three times.
August - searches and enquiries conducted on both sides, everything ticking over
Now - received incorrect sale contract, waiting for correct one. Both solicitors should be reporting this week, once this is done we can discuss dates! BUT we go on holiday next Thursday for 10 days. Aghhh!

I will be so glad once it's all over, it's been so stressful!

[TokyoSushi]

Oh wow Zebra, that's horrific!! Really, really hope you get sorted soon!

Our mortgage offer will be through tomorrow apparently, for £300 less than we wanted, God knows why they're quibbling over £300 in the grand scheme of things but hopefully that'll be it done!

[MovingThisYearHopefully]

Hi all, I was originally here last year. Its been a huge rollercoaster & no sign of an end yet.

We originally went SSTC in July 17 & it fell through in October. Wasted 5 months on the market with Purplebricks, who promised the earth but failed to deliver. Lost the house we were buying in February.

Went back on market in May, new EA.
Went SSTC finally in August at 9.4% below original asking price.
Nothing on the market to buy so went to plan B & reserved a new build.
Our solicitors (online firm) are pretty swift & already done lots on the purchase. Heard nothing from our buyers solicitor yet. This suits us as our new build is due to complete Dec/Jan & with the reduction in price we're going to struggle if we need to move into rented, although we will do so if necessary as we said we would.
It really is about time our luck changed. Its been far too long!

[MovingThisYearHopefully]

Just read your post Zebra. And I thought we were having a bad time! Hopefully things finally are going yours & our way.

[zebrapig]

Fingers crossed Moving! I've totally detached myself from the whole process now, I don't think I'll actually relax until we've got the keys and move in. Really hoping we can exchange in the next couple of weeks to move when we get back. Given everything we've been through I can see me trying to sort things while we're on holiday in a different country!

[IKnowThisMuch]

Hi folks!

I'm still here too

Our Situation -

• Offer accepted on house at the end of July.
  
• Surveyor our second week of August.
  
• Solicitor confirmed receipt of Sales Advice at the end of August.
  
  OH and I are FTBs, and vendor moving into a new build property.
  
  Solicitor advised they were waiting for title deeds coming from vendor's solicitor and then they would commence Searches etc.
  
  No word on exchange dates as of yet. Expected completion will be somewhere around late November / early December 🤞🏻

[IKnowThisMuch]

Should also probably say that mortgage offer is all in place, and we were offered the amount we needed to buy.

[GoldTag]

Thanks @BuildingThings ! Yes hoping my solicitor keeps up with the bossy approach, glad she's on my side!

Your vendor's secretive sale does sound strange, I wonder why she doesn't want the bf to know? As for paying the solicitor, the only upfront cost I had to pay the solicitor related to my sale was the fee that she needed to get the management pack from the freeholder of my flat (as it's a leasehold property) - so it could be something like that?

[JustLurk1ng]

Just got called for permission to exchange! Is it finally happening?! Fingers all crossed...

@BuildingThings that sounds very odd/dodgy! Hope it works out 🤞🏻

[JustLurk1ng]

Fail... bottom of the chain not ready 🤦🏻‍♀️

[LIVIA999]

Oh @JustLurk1ng nightmare.

[CarolineTheChemist]

Hello all!
It's good to see some of the same names from the "how many viewings are you getting" thread and reassuring to know that the struggle continues for others as well. Thanks for sharing your misery with us!

After the debacle that was getting the price right and getting viewings for DH's shared flat, we've also now progressed to the agonising part of being buyers ourselves.

Our story (not including the selling part):

early May '18 - got info from EA about a house with lots of potential, wasn't able to go to both open days because we were on hols for next 2 weeks. Was told by EA that the house was likely to be sold by the time we got back.
mid May - got back from hols, house still on the market, 1 week later offered asking price after first viewing. Offer accepted in principle, but house still on the market cos we were not able to proceed
mid July - DH's flat finally sells, go back to house for second viewing, our offer is formally accepted by vendor
mid Aug - found on the district council website that the vendor has offered 6 acres of land next to house to the council for a housing development!! EA were not aware of this. The house is rural, currently has no neighbours and is accessed by right of way through this land. Vendor agrees to withdraw offer to council, but will not sell us this land instead
23rd Aug - survey done by specialist conservation surveyor. The house is about 300yrs old and is in quite a state. Survey estimates around £200K of work required!!
3rd Sept - contacted EA to suggest renegotiation of price. We've dropped our offer by 10%. No response so far...

so now we wait and see... and hope they don't just tell us to sod off thanks, but no thanks!

We had initially thought we'd be in by the end of September! How foolish and wrong we were.

[BuildingThings]

Thanks @GoldTag! EA has called today to tell us that a solicitor has been instructed.. Finally… Hurrah! I wonder how long the rest of this process is going to take...

@JustLurking oh no! So close! Did they tell you what the problem is at the bottom of the chain?


@Triggered hope you manage to exchange on the 21st. I think going on holiday right before might be good for you to help get over the stress of conveyancing and hopefully nothing major happens while you’re away!

@Livia I agree with you regarding not breathing while in this process! Ha! I wish we didn’t tell any of our relatives/friends about our offer being accepted, getting everyones hopes up, now I feel like we will disappoint them if this falls through. Going to keep our mouths shut next time!


@Zebrapig that’s just awful really hope your luck changes soon!

@Tokyo hope you’ve got your mortgage offer through today?


Hi @MovingThisYear! I feel like I know you because I’ve been following the Sellers roll call thread. So happy you’ve finally managed to sell!



Welcome @IknowThisMuch and @Caroline!

[Kattatty87]

So spoke to estate agent today to confirm that the chain was complete to be told that the top buyers had actually chosen a house thats not chain free

So now waiting to hear back. Ive told them someone will need to break the chain as myself and ftb buying our place will be ready to exchange in the next 7 weeks and ftb will not hang around whilst the top of the chain is -never ending- still negotiating on properties.

Will be a stand off to see who is willing to go into rented....

[JustLurk1ng]

@BuildingThings - issue with the deposit.

They will try again tomorrow but EA suggested realistically won't be able to exchange til early next week. Completion date has been agreed for 13th so torn between hoping that it will slip out so we get some breathing room, and hoping it won't so we get it over and done with.

Fingers crossed for tomorrow! To those of you that have or have almost exchanged - where you contacted for exchange approval before the chain was ready. I'm a bit puzzled it got to that if everyone isn't ready to go!

[TokyoSushi]

Ugh, nothing here today, call yesterday morning to say that our 'mortgage offer will be through in 24 hours' still waiting...