Renters won't leave the house I'm buying, they 'can't find anywhere suitable'.

[wirldsgonemad]

But thanks to covid, a section 21 means people have 6 months instead of 2 months to vacate and this means I get charged £4,250 extra in stamp duty, plus mortgage application fees and survey of £1k plus my life being on hold for 6 months.

They are fully aware of my position, they know I'm a single mother of 2 small children and they don't give two hoots that they're actions are costing me £5-6k and months of waiting.

God give me strength to get through these next few months without attacking them on a regular basis.

What would you do in my situation???

@LIZS

You have not yet lost 6k though. Many purchases fall through with consequential losses for survey, mortgage arrangement fees, legalities etc. The Stamp Duty holiday is a bonus period so not completing in time is not an actual loss, merely a missed opportunity.

I'll be £4,250 poorer so it is a loss

But you have not spent it and won't if you pull out.

@LIZS

But you have not spent it and won't if you pull out.

Since last August I've budgeted for the going through this feb. I've sold my property and whether I buy this or another house, I'll now be paying stamp duty so it is a real tangible loss.

@wirldsgonemad

Mortgage would not exchange until tenants left, solicitor and mortgage broker had no reason to think the renters wouldn't leave.

Your solicitor never mentioned this as a possibility? Pretty shit solicitors in that case.

It's just not proceedable.

You can't exchange without vacant possession. The tenants can't, & shouldn't be expected to, just disappear.

All very unfortunate that your vendor has been an idiot, but them's the breaks.

I'd pull out & look elsewhere. Tell the vendor that you might still be interested if & when he's got an empty house to sell, but keep actively looking. (& bargain hard if it becomes available with vacant possession in the future, if you still want it & haven't found an alternative).

Basically, this house is not one you can currently buy, because it's got someone else living in it for the foreseeable.

In theory, you could go for a BTL mortgage & all the other hassle of being a landlord - & you still wouldn't be able to move in for months, at least. So you'd have to find & pay for accommodation elsewhere, which presumably isn't what you want to do.

It's on the vendor. He has rendered his house unsaleable to anyone but another landlord, effectively.

I'd just think of it as if he'd decided to take it off the market. You might love it; it's not available.

@wirldsgonemad

Solicitor was not concerned, mortgage broker was not concerned.

Of course not! It isn't their money!

The landlord didn't even serve s21 two months ago??

@Radio4Rocks

I feel sorry for both sides here and think OP is being given an unnecessary kicking by some.

The tenancy is up and the tenants should move out - they knew this was coming. It's unfair that tenants can squat when the tenancy is up and the property needed as a home by someone else.

They aren't squatting, they're renting.

I would pull out
It's not the only house you'll love. There's millions of houses out there. You may even find something better.

So S21 only just issued even though you have been on this since September. Absolutely incredible!

I cannot believe you or the seller or the solicitors involved went 4/5 months on this without actually giving notice and just ‘hoping’ the tenants would choose to vacate without notice.

Your solicitors would not just accept this if they knew. Did the solicitors know notice hadn’t been given until very recently?

How can you be complaining that they won’t leave when theyve only actually just been given notice....until that point, the tenancy could go on indefinitely regardless of if a sale is underway.

Why didn’t the landlord give notice before? Why didn’t you insist he gave notice before? Again, there could be an issue of whether he is serious about selling or just doing all this for show to the mortgage company he’s in arrears to. Serious sellers only market once a property is vacant. Greedy chancer landlords try to market with tenants in the property and give notice the minute they have a sale if not at the point they start marketing. NO ONE gets a buyer underway and fails to give notice until another 5 months have passed. Crazy.

And you haven’t lost £5k. If you walk away now, you have lost what you have spent.....which I hope would include nothing to a solicitor who seemingly hasn’t done their job.

It just doesn’t add up as a story.

This is a mess. Firstly, your mortgage offer is unlikely to be valid by the time you can actually exchange so what does that mean for your product fee? Second, your offer is inflated by the stamp duty holiday - after April house prices are likely to fall accordingly, and probably plus some. Why does your solicitor believe the tenants will be out in 6 months if the s21 has only just been issued? I understand you want to buy the house but this sounds like potentially a very long and expensive haul.

To be honest, my solicitor, like many others out there, has been very busy with lots of exchanges etc because the property market has been very hot. He didn't show concern re the tenants.

And tenants moved in in August, then 4 months later in December were asked to leave, but not issued a s.21. Only when they said they couldn't find somewhere was a s.21 issued.

I get you love the property. But I feel this has gone past the stage of rocking the boat. The Vendor has either through greed or naivety severely disadvantaged you. Redressing that balance is fine & necessary.

@brogueish

This is a mess. Firstly, your mortgage offer is unlikely to be valid by the time you can actually exchange so what does that mean for your product fee? Second, your offer is inflated by the stamp duty holiday - after April house prices are likely to fall accordingly, and probably plus some. Why does your solicitor believe the tenants will be out in 6 months if the s21 has only just been issued? I understand you want to buy the house but this sounds like potentially a very long and expensive haul.

Yes my mortgage offer runs out in a couple of weeks hence the £1k loss of mortgage application and associated survey.

@wirldsgonemad

The landlord is reasonable and I believe the tenants are reasonable. All decent people from what I can tell. Landlord had property listed to sell or rent, rent was agreed, whilst I was ringing to get viewing for purchase. All happened closely, landlord really wants to sell. The best thing would be if the renters found somewhere perfect for them. I would chip in £2k. It's such a mess.

No, landlord is a greedy dick who made the house unsellable except to other LLs because he wanted to trouser cash and sell it, too. If he'd really wanted to sell it, he'd never have taken in tenants. Now he wants you to deal with the fallout. He cares FA about anything past the bottom of his purse.

You need to be of this mindset as well.

This can end up costing you much more and that's if you can even complete because you say your lender won't with tenants in it.

This is a no brainer. Pull out.

@CoffeeRunner

I get you love the property. But I feel this has gone past the stage of rocking the boat. The Vendor has either through greed or naivety severely disadvantaged you. Redressing that balance is fine & necessary.

Let's see what happens, there's a chance to do that further down the line.

@wirldsgonemad

Mortgage would not exchange until tenants left, solicitor and mortgage broker had no reason to think the renters wouldn't leave.

Why, for goodness sake? The tenancy had only just started, there was covid, lack of places available to rent. Who in their right mind would assume the tenants, having gone to all the trouble of finding a place to rent, setting up the rental, and moving in, would be happy to move on being told "I'm selling the house, you'll leave in the next two months (or whatever), won't you?" Even if they're willing to consider it, no-one can guarantee that they'll find an alternative place to live.

@wirldsgonemad

I agree that the owner has tried to have his cake and eat it by renting while the sale went through. He's been wanting to sell, but accepted renters, then I cane along and offered to buy. I agree it is the renters home but it's been advertised as for sale. Someone would have bought it if it hadn't been me, the market is hot now.

But it is you and you're screwed.

If you choose to keep going then you're going to have to accept the consequences

You're still of the mistaken impression that the seller is a good person and this is all the renters' faults and everyone will be reasonable. This seller is playing you like a harp from hell. The tenants only care about themselves, quite rightly.

Don't be silly, @RedcurrantPuff

Just beware wirlds that in (potentially) 6 to 9 or even 12 months time when the tenants leave (hopefully) or a court orders possession, that at that point the house will be more desirable to other buyers. If the market rises, or the seller gets greedy (and he has shown he is greedy) you could get gazumped or he could put it back on the market.

Keep an eye on the market, something better and less hassle might come up.

And I'm glad you have a better understanding of the tenants' position now.

I've had a solicitor since September last year, all paperwork done, mortgage in place, ready to exchange, waiting for tenants to leave so exchange can take place and within a week or so completion. Then tenants said they couldn't find anywhere, a few weeks if back and forward involving offers of cash etc then the conclusion that they wouldn't leave so s21 issued this week and instead of moving in the next couple of weeks as planned it will now be in 6 months.

So everyone’s been proceeding on some sort of gentleman’s agreement that the tenants would move out in 6 months? And none of the property professionals raised an objection. And the vendor/LL didn’t do his legal duty to serve official notice?

You’ve been really naive and in the process properly screwed. And you seem to be willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the vendor/LL and not ask him to foot the cost of his mistake.

Reduce your offer by 6k?

To be honest, my solicitor, like many others out there, has been very busy with lots of exchanges etc because the property market has been very hot. He didn't show concern re the tenants

Then he's an utter fool. A "hot" market doesn't excuse a failure to warn you about something so very basic, and I'm wondering if he's a proper solicitor at all, or just one of these self-styled "conveyancers"?

The vendor's a fool too, for somehow just assuming the tenants would leave without proper notice and generally cocking the entire thing up

I agree with PPs that this just doesn't add up, but if the details are anything like accurate you'd be frankly mad to go ahead. You may well love the place, but unfortunately it just isn't available for an owner occupier purchase - end of