Thinking of pulling out of sale - when is enough enough?

[LittlePickleHead]

So stressed by all of this!

We are 5 1/2 months down the line from accepting an offer on our house, and considering pulling out of the sale. Could do with some advice as to whether our buyers solicitors are being unnecessarily obstructive and to whether this is a good idea.

We did take 3 months to find a property, and our buyers were on the brink of pulling out as their mortgage offer expires mid December and they were worried about timescales. We found somewhere, and our offer was accepted prior to it going on the market as we were so far down the line with our buyers and they wanted a quick sale. All well and good we should have been able to complete mid November.

However we initially had 3 pages of further enquiries (our solicitor did comment this was excessive), and there are still more coming. Every time we send the buyers solicitors what they have asked for, they come back with more requests and queries. Some are totally ridiculous. We have two lawyers working for us and both agree that the scale of requests has now become an issue (it is fairly complicated as involves a lease extension, although we own a share of freehold so should have been much more straightforward than it has been made by the buyers solicitors).

We are only a couple of weeks off the buyers having to reapply for a new mortgage, have new surveys etc, and obviously with Christmas in the way we are left in limbo as everyone had been pushing to complete before Christmas. There is no sign of the buyers solicitors backing down on some of the issues, and so I now feel that we would actually be better off pulling out and finding new buyers that will hopefully be a bit more straightforward (none of the issues came up when we bought the place, admittedly some should have, but the vast majority are just time consuming and unnecessary requests).

The market is fast moving here and I am worried about losing our purchase, but we could definitely get more for our property now.

But it seems risky when we are so near (yet so far).

Does anyone have any advice? This is literally taking over my life :(

I would be getting in touch with the estate agents, say the house may be going back on the market about 16th December, would they like to revalue it, and do they have any clients who would like an informal look round just out of interest.

After six months I think your prospective buyers have either lost interest, or carried on looking at other houses (I would have) and have found one they prefer. If their offer is accepted they will drop you.

If the buyers "find out" you can always tell them that, since their mortgage offer expires mid Dec and they are not yet ready to exchange, you want to be prepared (sweet smile).

What Piglet says. Alternatively just tell the buyers if they haven't exchanged by 16th (with a fixed completion date) the house will be back on the market, and tell your agents to be prepared.

Are they first time buyers? Can be very nervous and pedantic. Still seems madness that this dragging on. Piglet john has a good idea there. Though I might be more direct and just tell them if they don't complete soon and give a date, you are putting house back on market.

It is crazy out there! Join the stressed out buyers and sellers thread on Property and vent like me!

I agree with purple, give them the ultimatum of exchanging by 16th or you are putting back on the marker. Presumably you will then take the risk of your vendors doing the same as they won't then have a completed chain.

The time it is taking may not have anything to do with your buyers themselves, they may just have a picky and/or slow solicitor acting for them.

Hi Little, have you seen the thread on property section for stressed out buyers and sellers? It's great for venting and advice.

Ultimatum time although I might be a bit sneaky and get the agent to discreetly show the flat to a few keen people so I had another buyer potentially waiting in the wings.

yes

then if the buyers really are getting on with it, you don't need to frighten them off (yet)

Thanks, def need to check out that thread!

They are first time buyers and one of them is also a solicitor which I think has raised the pedantry levels. I have wondered if it's a ruse to stall us, but we are now directly in contact with the buyers and they seem as keen as us to move it on, but their solicitor won't budge on their demands.

I've spoken to the agent and they know we are considering going back on the market, so I think ultimatum time next week. Just have to keep our fingers crossed that there are no delays to our purchase if we go down that route.

Argh!

The buyers are the solicitor's clients, the solicitor can advise but cannot over-rule them. All they have to say is, "We understand the risk and we'd like to proceed anyway." There's no need for them to let their solicitor set the pace like this.

Well that's what I thought but they are obviously also being advised by them, and are taking the advice that all the requests they have made are necessary. But we are taking our solicitors advice that they have gone above and beyond the call of duty and that we could have agreed everything by now.

It's very frustrating!

Blimey Little, that sounds ridiculous. One thing I would bare in mind is where are you, as some places the prices in the last six months have risen very quickly and it may well be that your property is worth an awful lot more now.

Yes OneStep, around £20k more if the agents are to be believed!

Sadly my experience of solicitors as buyers is that they will be complete PITAs & then try & drop the price at the last minute. Our next door neighbours did this (both solicitors), my father's buyer did (property lawyer but we put the house back on the market & told him to get lost) and another family (one solicitor) did the same. Move on as fast as you can.

Oh god, i would get the msg to the solicitor one of the buyers that this is not a fucking law school exercise, it's real life and he/she needs to grow up and let his/her actual solicitor do their job! (Newly qualified lawyers can be ever so keen know it alls)

Whatwill his is exactly the impression we have been getting - every possible little thing you could ever think of has been brought up, from the sublime to the ridiculous, and it's become a bit of a farce.

I'm just so annoyed we have wasted so much time (and money) if we go back on the market

I wouldn't take them seriously after almost 6 months. Mentally you need to move on.

we ended up dealing with some of this for my MiL's house sale. One of the questions asked by the buyer's solicitors was 'how long ago had the hall and landing been decorated'. I drafted the response along the lines of 'the period since it has been decorated is immaterial as it could have been decorated 5 months ago and if 12 dogs and a football team lived in the house it could still need redoing. They also decided that, as there was a bit of an internal crack on the front of the bay, that the house was suffering from subsidence and would need £15k of work doing and insurance... However, we managed to et a local builder / surveyor to look at it, confirm that he'd never seen any subsidence on any of the other Victorian terraced properties he'd worked on in that road (including his own, two doors down) and that as the external brickwork was fine and had clearly not been repointed for 12 years at least, it wasn't subsidence. Basically the buyers were told to get their finger out and stop trying it on and complete or it was going back on the market - and they suddenly changed their tune - and exchanged and completed to timescale.

Just received correspondence from our buyers urging us to still complete before Christmas so I've had to point out that it is the volume of the requests being asked of us that is making this impossible. Maybe there is light at the end of the tunnel if they can agree to compromise on some all of the sticking points.

I guess next week will be crunch time, and whether we can agree a realistic completion date before Christmas.

Had a little cry (mostly from frustration) now I'm on the and will try and forget about it for the weekend (impossible!)