The decluttering, cleaning, vacating, pandering, nailbiting antics of the stressed out house sellers goes on and on....

[TerrysNo2]

New thread!

Come share and despair :)

Sorry, that should read "............. waited until EXCHANGE ............"

We're going to have a lot less furniture than space! But we've been selling off sports kit we don't use and made £70 this weekend on eBay.

DH apparently has some war gaming stuff that could make a bundle

I am resisting the urge to sell everything that's not essential right now!

I'm resisting the sell off.
No furniture is coming with us. International move back to UK.
I have to wait till all the inspections are done and approved then it's all on. Shippers will have all our stuff bar whats in our suitcases, and we live where there is no public transport, so my car has to go and fingers crossed our good friends don't bail on driving us to the airport.

Argh! We've been dream buyers for our vendor - no messing about or haggling, communication at every stage, no chain. It took a long time to get our mortgage sorted but we chased it every 2 days for weeks and communicated about all of that. We've sent along our signed contract and we need to provide a couple of bits of documentation today before we'll be able to send our deposit.

The vendor (very old and apparently very stressed about everything) is having a hissy fit over our completion date. We wanted 30 Aug, he wanted 27 Aug (which we can't do as DH is overseas that date). We suggested 23 Aug which is incovenient money wise, but we can manage. His family want the bank holiday to clear the house so he's threatening to pull out if we don't agree to 27th! (He moved out last year so the house is vacant). I don't understand why this is an issue and I hate being made to feel like the difficult party. His family have weeks to empty the house (in fact they've had months to start getting rid of stuff!)

If he elects to pull out after we have signed our part of the contract and paid a deposit, where do we stand?

oh god, ghost what a nightmare :(

No advice to give, but that does seem extraordinarily difficult behavior for an empty house. You must be so frustrated.

We won't be selling anything if and when we finally move - all of our furniture is argos value or hand me down anyway, so the tip would be a kindness! Can't wait to give it all a good going over though.

Oh ghost how horrific. What does your conveyancer say? Can you tell the legal team not to pass your deposit across yet until this date is agreed? I would say that your vendor is probably calling your bluff. There's no way you can move while your DH is overseas and he must realise that.

thanks folks, I am trying to stay calm about it as I actually don't believe he will pull out over this. I feel sorry for him that he is finding it stressful, but I don't think he has a realistic picture of what house buying and selling is really like! Our solicitor has been a bit... weak... really and is just passing along messages, no advice or anything. I think actually the estate agent is going to go round and try to talk some sense into him.

What's three days compared to trying to find a new buyer who has to be immediately proceedable, based on his instruction? Three days versus several more months! In this instance I feel like if we could meet him I'd be able to calm him down and show him that we are genuine, and family buyers who will be gutted if we lose the house.

TBH if he tries to pull out I will want to find out if he is liable for any of our expenses, having strung us along. Hmm.

Oh dear ghost. I'll keep my fingers crossed that they see some sense for you.
I hope is is liable for expenses, maybe say you'll sue in small claims over it if they push it.

Thank you!

DH has been on the phone this afternoon and the EA has been round to visit the vendor. Looks like we're back on for the 30th. Phew!

Can I ask for advice from you wise ladies?

It looks like we will be completing on the new house on Aug 30th, in exactly a month. We expect we'll be moved out of our current (unsold as yet) home by mid Sept. When do we need to start contacting utilities people etc? We will want phone and broadband to transfer from mid Sept I guess, when we actually move over. We'll have to keep gas, electric, water running at the old house until we sell.

On the plus side I can pop into the old house from work to pick up post etc. I'm finding it hard to figure out what we need to start doing! Any advice?

Can't help with utilities as it's been a good few years since I moved. I guess you don't need to do final readings for those until you sell. Not sure about telcoms; hopefully someone else on here can advise.

But apparently child benefit takes a good few weeks so if this applies to you and you need evidence for school apps, then I'd action this from point of exchange.

Just had the EA on the phone, who can't tell me when a survey is likely to happen, my buyer seems to have changed mortgage provider and financial advisor (so wasted a fortnight) and we are in a chain of seven houses.

Argh. Is seven too long? Is this ever going to happen? Bloody hell. I do not like moving house!

Ghost - from what I recall from last moving, I think I contacted utilities, council tax, phone provider, etc about two weeks before the move by letter or email with "from x date we are at new address details", then just telephoned utilities to give them a meter reading on the day of moving out.

I had a list of people to change address with but still managed to forget vet, dentist and car insurance company.

Our sale is moving swiftly, surveyor came to out on Monday morning and said he'd have his report to the bank by today. Buyers are looking at moving in asap. We've pretty much decided to buy a new build which won't be ready until December/January so we're looking at renting for a few months.

Hi Ghost,

We have just done this though we only had two houses for three weeks till we completed on the old house. We had a mortgage deal that we can pay off a large chuck of the mortgage without penalties as we knew we would have some overlap.
We had to insure both houses for the three weeks. I informed the TV licensing that the old house was empty and therefore not liable for a TV licence and our new address which now was. I told the water board and they would have done a final reading of the meter if we had said we weren't going to use any water for the cross over time but as we needed to water the garden in the heat wave we kept it on. We also kept up the gas and electric and just did a final reading before completion. We also only told the council after completion but gave them all the dates when we completed on the new house, when we vacated the old house, who the solicitors were etc.

The phone and Internet were a nightmare and BT messed it all up ending up with us having no phone or broadband for three weeks. So start early on that one.

We still have loads of places and people to inform but I am working slowly through the list. I nearly forgot about the cats microchips but I changed that before letting them out.

I'm on edge today. I've clean the place within an inch of it's life, shiny showers and floors and went out and swept the front by the door too.
Bank appraiser is coming could be here any time. fingers crossed it appraises for enough so the buyers can get their mortgage.
Dh is convinced it'll appraise lower, so we had to talk about what we'll accept if the buyer comes back to ask for a reduction, that or they'll have to pony up a bigger down payment.

Well he's been and gone, cool as a cucumber, personality of one too. Measured, took photos asked questions. Then left. So now the nail biting wait begins.

Thanks folks, really helpful!

alfie good to know we're not the only ones

ghost here, just bumping the thread under my NC.

Still haven't exchanged on the purchase! And another low offer from a renter on the sale. We had a second viewing and are hoping for some news from that which will affect how we consider the other offer.

Good luck everyone, hope it works out ok Ghost. I have been lurking on here for a few weeks. Been on the market for 2 months with nothing, then Thursday we got a viewing!!! Hurrah! Unfortunately still no feedback on this yet. The viewer is in a great position, currently renting, so would be great for us. Crossing fingers here!

Good luck oopnorth I hope it's the start if things for you.

Found out today that there are several 2 bed appts in my town which are £60-£100k more than my house, and a lovely 3 bed Victorian terrace with no garage and teeny garden which is £120k more!

Haven't updated on this thread for a bit....
Update so far is....we lost our buyer and dh was threatened with redundancy, on the same day!
Came off the market for a bit, DH's job was saved and we're now trying to sell again.
Our dream house is still sitting there unsold at the moment, but frustratingly the EA are having trouble with their server and haven't been able to get anything online for a week!

That's pretty unlucky turnip - hope that means it's serendipitously going to come together for you at some stage

Hi all!

I'm pretty lost on this thread now too so good to see some updates albeit no exchanges / completions to celebrate. Come on everyone

Our process is frustrating, we had hoped to exchange last week but our buyer has hired some rubbish solicitor who is moving at a snails pace. We need to complete by 19th August so the builders have time to get in before DS starts school. Oh and apparently the upward chain can't move until 30th August as its the first day they can get off work so the EA is asking our vendor to move out and go on holiday for a couple of weeks.

Here's praying all our ducks get in a nice orderly and obedient line asap!

Congrats on your Dh still having a job Turnip.
It's a week today since the man came to do the valuation, I have to call and see if they know how it came out, this is all dragging on. It's all supposed to close at the end of August.
I think I'm going to give myself an ulcer with stress.
Banging my head on a wall here.