To keep chasing our solicitor and estate agent for updates every couple of days?

[Rain2122]

Hi all,

The situation is that we're in a chain waiting to exchange. We've been ready to exchange on the purchase side for weeks but our buyer's solicitor is not ready to exchange. We do not fully understand the current status and how long things will take to resolve.

We do know our buyer's mortgage offer expires in less than 2 weeks (i.e. we have less than 2 weeks to exchange and complete). I am panicking because interest rates have gone up so much that if the chain falls apart, it will cost us an eye-watering sum (tens of thousands).

I've not heard from our estate agent since Monday (letting us know he couldn't get hold of anyone and was waiting for calls back) and we've had nothing from our solicitor for a couple of weeks (an email to her a few days ago has gone unanswered).

I don't want to be that unreasonable client who keeps chasing for updates too often, but there's a lot of money at stake and every day matters at the moment!

What do you think?

i think that’s pretty normal for this stage of the process. And with this much at stake.

Chase them every single day, we took it easy on our rubbish solicitor and oh boy did we have regrets.

call them every morning - if they agree to call you and they don’t then get on the phone. Don’t send emails when you can make a call - nag them so much they can’t wait to get rid of you. Squeaky wheel gets the oil

Last sale and purchase I did the EA advised me to chase up the solicitor at least once a week, preferably speak with them twice a week. If one of them says they’ll get back to you within 24 hours and they don’t, call them. She who nags completes!

I'd be tempted to visit their office if it is practical. Much less easy to fob someone off than if you phone.

OH has just called the estate agent again who tells us simply there is no update because they can't get hold of the buyer's solicitor.

I don't understand why they can't call the buyer and ask if she has applied for a mortgage offer extension because if the answer is no then things are looking very gloomy. They don't need to speak to her solicitor to get the answer to that!

With our house purchase last year, what really got things moving was when we talked to the vendors directly so we could both chivvy things along simultaneously and cut through the "we are waiting for the vendor to do this" or "the buyer needs to that" responses we had both been getting.

Chase every day otherwise you just go to the bottom of the pile.

And do it with a view to being like right, what are we waiting for? Can you call them yourself? Who else can you chase up? Can you call the buyers solicitors? My DH had to go into my solicitors in person to get answers at one point because he stopped answering the phone us. book appointments with them if you can’t easily reach them on the phone.

dont sit back and wait for these people to get shit done because they won’t. You need to do it if you want to exchange

I'm pretty sure that you phoning won't fix whatever it is they're waiting for.

if my estate agent said that I would definitely be calling the buyers solicitor - when did the estate agent last try to call for example?

Your buyer will be getting the runaround from the bank, won't want the solicitor to tell anyone in case it puts the frighteners on the chain, no one can do anything until the finances are in place and that is outside of your solicitor's and your buyer's solicitor's control. You can phone every day if you feel the need but none of it will make a blind bit of difference.

Speak to your buyers if you can. Your buyer's solicitor will not speak to. Legally, they can't. Also, don't contact your solicitors everyday. We hate that. Of course they will contact you when they know something as they don't get paid until the chain completes.

Also, get the agents to chase. They can speak to the whole in (unlike your solicitor - they will have no idea how long the chain is as agents never share this information).

‘Not being able to get hold of the other party’s solicitor’ is a time honoured excuse on a par with ‘the dog ate my homework’. You are definitely not being unreasonable to keep nagging.

I think mostly they say it to stop people getting jittery.

I'd contact the buyer direct if at all possible. It is not unknown for solicitors to fob clients off, let alone other parties in a chain.

Squeaky wheel gets the grease! They’ll deal with you quickly to get rid of you…

In my experience unless you chase you get nowhere! So I'd continue - I just made a pest of myself otherwise I think I'd still be waiting to move 8 weeks later!! Good luck,.

yup chase, chase and chase some more, and if you don't get a response go and stand in reception till they talk to you.

As you can tell I didn't have a good time with solicitors or estate agents.

My dd is buying atm she is waiting for a lease extension as her mortgage offer has about 6 weeks left and if it runs out she can't afford to buy. She doesn't know if she is allowed to contact the estate agent, is this allowed as her solicitors just keep telling her they're chasing it up? She is getting very stressed.

Chase chase chase chase chase!

We’re in a similar situation and are so glad we chased. We chased for ages on one point, then our point of contact was off sick and (because we chased) we found out from her colleague that our lawyer was lying to us (in writing and on recorded phone calls) claiming to be waiting on the other side when, in fact, she’d not done any of our work for six weeks and everyone was waiting on her! She’d been telling us she was waiting to hear back! If we hadn’t chased then who knows when the work would’ve actually been done - and we got almost £1000 knocked off our legal fees.

The squeaky wheel gets the oil and most conveyancing is done by unqualified, unlicensed and unregulated paralegals - you have to really check up on them to get them to prioritise you. Unfortunately, it’s a profession with far too many bad people working in it who give everyone a bad reputation.

She’s allowed to contact absolutely anyone she likes as long as they haven’t taken out a restraining order against her.

I am an agent (not in the UK) but I would advise to chase every morning and if you cannot get through, then chase at lunch time when you have more chance of getting past whoever is manning the phones. But do NOT give up. Keep asking what the hold up is and who you can follow up with. Every. Single. Day.

@Ffsmakeitstop yes, she can contact the estate agent!
I probably got 2 calls a day off the estate agent selling the house we were buying in the final week (it all got a bit fraught, and people were threatening to pull out).

Oh heavens - I really do feel for you. I moved into my new home last year after well over a year of trying to get the job done and banging my head against a brick wall over and over again. But you just have to keep banging - if you are not like a dog with a bone nothing happens; you just get left in a pile of other stuff.

Keep chasing!! We had to do this and the solicitors said the issue wasn’t their fault, so they didn’t need to apologise etc. but they had been slow to chase and inform on several errors that could’ve sped up the process. It is their job to get the deal done in a timely fashion and that means communication.

We ended up getting some money back because of the headache but I think chasing was the only way we got it all done in time! Good luck!