What could delay completion after exchange?

[Littleturkish]

Our vendors want nearly two weeks between exchange and completion bringing it very close to the expiry of our mortgage offer.

Is there any chance that between exchange and completion something could go wrong and delay it, meaning our mortgage offer would expire and we couldn't complete?

And if that did happen, would we lose our 10%?

I don't trust my solicitor or estate agent to answer this truthfully, they've lied to us on an almost weekly basis about so much, I have no faith in them!

They're not teachers are they? They do like to wait for school holidays before they move.

I'm a teacher. I'd move mid week if it would mean that the nightmare of buying and selling would be over.

Are your vendors buying somewhere else? They may need the time to get all their money from wherever it is stashed, or simply want the comfort of being able to organise completion day.

If you are in a position to complete on the right day I.e. Your solicitor has received your mortgage money and any other money from you, and sent it to the sellers, you would not be the "guilty" party causing a delay and therefore you would not lose your deposit.

If you are late sending the money for whatever reason(eg the bank has a problem on completion day) the seller has to serve a notice to complete and you usually then have a week to come up with the funds before they cancel the contract and keep your deposit money. You would have to pay a daily rate of interest until the monies are through and the contract completed. This situation is unusual and in many years of conveyancing practice I have never seen anyone lose their deposit.

It's very rare for something to happe that would majorly throw it. It may get thrown by a day for logistical reasons when you're actually there - my in laws couldn't pick up the keys until the day after completion because there was a delay in all the money in the chain moving to the right place on completion day so theirs didn't go through. They were charged interest as a penalty but claimed it from the people below who'd caused it.

But once you've exchanged and set the completion date, it's very rare for anything beyond something like this to cause problems.

I would speak director your mortgage company if you're worried. You may be able to get them to extend your mortgage offer if need be. We were able to do this with our offer when it was taking a long time to get to the point of exchange.

Director? Directly!

That's really reassuring, thank you!

They are just SO stupid. I honestly don't think they're equipped to deal with life. All paperwork has been late, they lied about how far along the purchase they were to the estate agents (or the estate agent lied to us- they all blame each other) and have dragged out a sale that began six months ago and was supposed to take six weeks.

We're teachers and just want to get it over and done with!

They've blamed getting removal firms in as the reason for delaying...I just don't know why they would want to put it off when it could risk the sale not happening at all- we would never be allowed to extend our mortgage offer, so if we don't get it done by the end of May, we're not going to be able to buy their house!

Small, definitely won't be allowed to extend. If we go past May 31st we cannot buy this house, and will have to wait until I'm working again after maternity leave to apply again. Nightmare!

Are you sure they aren't going to pull out? Once you've exchanged they're committed so getting there is the big thing, but if they've faffed around so much over the purchase I'd be very suspicious. Lying about something isn't the same as being inept.

The completion date is set in stone in the contract, so cannot be changed after exchange without penalty. Agreeing a completion date is often a delaying factor in exchange

I have no faith in estate agents or solicitors.

My buyer told me about the completion date, my solicitor had failed to tell me. I eventually got a message the following morning asking me to contact them.

All the solicitors blame each other. I know my buyer so knew she was ready to go but my solicitor told me her solicitor was the problem. Tosh.

Hope it gets sorted.

I'm very worried they're going to pull out. They're buying a house with so many problems (no registered with land registry, lease hold but no lease, and the lease holder has died recently and it's just been a nightmare.

Talk to your solicitor. I think they could draw down the mortgage monies and leave them in their client account (with you paying interest on the loan from the date of draw down obviously) for a couple of days while waiting for any (very unlikely) glitches to resolve.

Good luck.

Two weeks between exchange and completion used to be perfectly normal, giving enough time to organise everything. More importantly, are you all actually ready to exchange? Because if you need to complete by the end of May, you should be exchanging soon. I see that there have been problems on the vendor's onward purchase so I'm not surprised it's taken so long - those are fairly major things to deal with and it's stuff like that which can crop up and cause delays, none of which are known at the outset. I assume your vendors had lived in the house for many years otherwise the fact that it is unregistered would have been picked up before.

Completion date is set in stone at exchange so once you've exchanged, and as long as completion date is within your mortgage offer, they have to sell you the house.

I can't see what could go wrong at your end as long as completion date is before the date your offer expires.

Ask for exchange ASAP with the agreed completion date.

We had 2 weeks between exchange and completion because we had to give a month's notice on our rental property to a certain date. We had told the vendor from the start that we couldn't afford a large crossover of rent and mortgage.

We're meant to be exchanging today, but yesterday the problem of completion day came up, so will probably be tomorrow now. I really resented the way the estate agent was just telling me it HAD to be 22nd, they've booked removal firm for that date- and I was like, what, without it being agreed?? Just so frustrating that they don't seem to be in any rush, when if they keep dragging it out, we won't be able to buy it.

Fingers crossed you exchange tomorrow Littleturkish Once that's done there's really no turning back - unless the person that breaks the terms of the contract wants to incur potentially massive costs - but I'm surprised that between the links in the chain a date that everyone is happy with hasn't been fully discussed/thrashed out in advance.

Last couple of times we've bought/sold we or our buyers have had a date in mind from the very outset (ie, when offers were made/accepted) and we've then all worked towards this date. Both times - but particularly the last in 2014 - we've kept in direct contact with our buyers. Initially I wasn't keen on this idea, but for us it worked and last time especially I'm convinced it held everything together.

Last year our buyers hoped we could exchange within four weeks and complete in six - it took about three/four weeks longer eventually, but we were all very persistent with our solicitors and EAs and kept the pressure on at all times. In fact our sol got a bit pissed off and threw his toys out the pram on one occasion, but it got results......

Our buyers were both teachers, btw and were happy to complete on a Tuesday.

Thanks raph our original date was before Christmas, and then since then it's gone from bad to worse- at one point our solicitor was saying that they thought the house that they were buying was "unsellable".

Then we were just told the 22nd without any proper discussion. Had to be the 22nd as it was favourable to them. We just have to trust now that they won't back out.

If they get fined, would we be financially compensated for them backing out?