Would anyone like an 'in a chain' support group?

[thenewaveragebear1983]

Would anyone like an 'in a chain' support thread? We're selling and buying and it's so stressful!! We've found our 'dream house' and had an offer accepted, had an offer on ours within a week which was subsequently retracted. Wondered if anyone else was finding this whole process ridiculously stressful?

Well we might exchange today... or we might not

Did you exchange yello?
Lots of developments in the cooker saga- she now only wants 200 for the cooker, so I'm glad we stood our ground. 200 is more manageable!
Having our house valued for our buyers on Friday, then I assume it's just mortgage offers from banks to solicitors then in the hands of the solicitors until completion? I think once it's at that stage I might start to relax a bit and get excited that it might happen!!

£200 much better than £400, hope things progress well.

No we haven't and I don't know when we will now! Turned out the house my vendor is buying was tenanted and the visit was to check for vacant possession and condition before exchange... And there is damage :-( So now there will be renegotiations about getting things f fixed or price negotiations.

If got my hopes up so a bit disappointed.

I'm not surprised! That's rubbish!
What happens in the situation of buying when there's tennants? I presume the vendor/LL had served them notice so if they don't go will you have to evict them?

Yeah so I think a condition of exchange is vacant possession, so notice is served and if they don't go a lengthy eviction process is entered into.

The tenants have gone - but the house is damaged!

It must have been quite upsetting for my vendors to have gone and found the house in a state. Good job they followed their sol advice about checking vacant possession and condition before exchange.

Annoying for me but st least I just sit and wait (and hope the chain doesn't collapse)!

Well our solicitors recieved the draft contracts from the other solicitors yesterday. Yay we thought!

Then today the solicitor came back to us with an issue!

We are a first floor , ex council maisonette, the building looks like a 1930s double fronted semi, the entrance to our property is up a concrete staircase on the side of the building. All the pathways are shared between the two properties. We both own half the front garden (we own right, downstairs own left) but the gardens have shared paths around them.

The buyers solicitors have said that the staircase is not highlighted on the deeds and therefore the property does not have its own access.

They have given us 2 options - to go through the freeholders legal team and have the deeds changed which could take months at "conservative" cost of £600!!! Or pay £150 for an insurance policy, should anyone restrict access in the future!

The problem is that I don't think it was included on purpose - the council own all the shared areas and are responsible for maintaining the shared parts. Technically downstairs do not have their own access either as their front step isn't included on the deeds and they have to use same path as us to reach their front door!

Grrrr

It's a very common property round here, so I will ask the estate agent tomorrow if this issue has come up before, I feel like we are being "done over" by the other solicitors!

Hello I hope you don't have too long a wait!
And well done bear on your £200 oven!

What was said about the stairs when you bought it? We have unofficial use of a side road to access our garage via the back of our garden and when we bought it our vendors wrote a declaration saying they have always had access this way and no issues etc. Perhaps you could do this and provide the indemnity? Or solicitor could liaise with council to see if they include it in their responsibility to maintain it? In a way it's better for buyers because they won't have a duty to repair or upkeep it. This must have come up when you purchased it so they will resolve it I'm sure. Stressful though!

Then today the solicitor came back to us with an issue!

A solicitor friend has said that this whole indemnity is just a total money making invention - before the view woudl have been - there might be a problem, but it hasn't become a problem in the last 20 years, so proceed. Now it is - there might be a problem, PAY INDEMNITY.

When I bought my house 8 years ago indemnity was never mentioned, then when I sold it I had to pay for indemnity for a few things, and my vendors for this purchase had to get a few policies.

Yes when I looked about indemnity policies online it said that so rarely are they claimed that they are based on the value of the house and not the actual issue or situation/risk anyway. Someone is making a killing selling them aren't they!

I was asked to get two on a property I just sold and I said no. Solicitors came back and said oh don't worry then, it's just another con to make money most of the time.

Basically the drawings show the staircase as part of the property but the wording States that we own the first floor and internal loft space only, no mention of staircase . The deeds state that freeholder owns all the external parts and is responsible for the maintenance - (they recently reprinted the brickwork on the staircase) they also state we have full access rights to the staircase/entrance and shared paths. So we own the first floor but not the staircase. The staircase is considered shared as it's an external part despite the fact that it is only used to access the first floor!

The EA was going to speak to the solicitors and get back to me. But he said that basically lendors will no longer take any risks and it could result in them retracting our buyers mortgage agreement!

The indemnity is against anyone preventing access to the proprty in the future! This type of thing is common with private freeholders, they might sell off part of a block etc or charge a fee for using shared parts. However that is a scenario that would never happen with our type of property or freeholder!

There must be over 100 properties of this design in this area, all ex-local authority. I think we must have got the overly-keen newly qualified jobsworth!

I just feel like we are being held to ransom!

But surely in any block of flats or such building, you don't own the stairs ? You only own the actual flat and someone else own all the communal areas? What do they do in these situations because the same could apply - this can't be the first time they've dealt with it like this

That's our argument!

Bloody thieves!

It's not like the council will ever decide to remove the staircase!

Technically the same could be said for the downstairs flat as they have a front step that protrudes out which does not show up on the drawings! Yet I can't imagine anyone ever questioning their access!

It never came up when we bought. And I have friends that have bought/sold similar property without a problem and EA said this is the first time he has come across this.

The buyers solicitor is saying that the deeds are incorrect and therefore not legally valid because the drawings say we do own the stairs but the wording implies that we don't!

It's just a money making scheme as you say - if the deeds are legally void then surely we would HAVE to go through the council legal team to be able to legally sell the property on!?

However, I think we might just have to admit defeat and buy the stupid indemnity!

I'm pretty sure that the indemnity industry depends wholly on people saying we might as well just get it to keep it moving. In the general scheme it's probably not a huge amount, so aside from the principle of it, it's probably easier to just buy it.

Watermelon - yes, flats/maisonettes do have communal areas which you don't own because the freeholder or landlord owns the building and land surrounding the building.

Because you own a flat/maisonette within the building you have to cross over communal areas to access your property, i.e. the stairs (and shared paths). Your title deeds should detail "rights" over the communal areas and it sounds as though your deeds only have the rights for crossing the shared paths to the staircase but not the staircase itsell, which means the deeds are defective because (although unlikely) the landlord or freeholder could technically refuse to allow you to cross over areas of the property to which you don't have rights. While it may seem to be pernickity, there have been cases where people have found their access taken away because they only had an informal arrangement.

The buyer's solicitor is acting in the best interests of his client and to purchase a property without formal "rights" to use the stairs would be negligent. So, in a nutshell, the freeholder agrees to giving you formal rights in the title and new title deeds are issued to you or you get an indemnity to protect the new owner against the "informal" rights being refused in the future . As it's your defective title, you would need to pay. While getting the deeds changed will delay the transaction, if everyone is motivated in their purchases, they will hopefully remain patient while this is done.

Sorry to say you are not being done over at all. Rules and regulations are very strict now - it was not an issue when you bought the property but now mortgage lenders will not risk their charge over a property with a defective title.

Spickle - The deeds state clearly that we have rights of access to the stairs, they just don't state that we own them, yet the drawings say that we do!

Drawings (are you talking about the Title Plan?) are not accurate and not to scale. If your deeds do not state that the stairs are within the demise, then you do not own them unfortunately.

Yeah basically that is what the solicitor has said so we have paid for the indemnity to keep things moving on.

Today however, a bigger problem!
The freeholder (local council) completed some works on the property in the spring, under a "qualifying long term agreement" they have made repairs/improvements to all of their housing stock.

origonally all leasehold properties on the street got the same estimate which included roof works and scaffolding. But we had already had some of the work quoted done about 2 years earlier, so they agreed with us and removed most of the work listed on the estimate. We then further negotiated the removal of other works when the council surveyor visited the property.

We should have been billed on the 1st September but now they are saying it won't be till the end of October!

The buyers solicitor has asked us to drop the amount owed for the work of the asking price. All fair enough as we had expected this to happen. However, the only work that was completed on the block was two 1m square areas of brick wall repointed and 4 door canopies were repainted. The solicitor is going with an earlier estimate of £3000.

So now on to negotiations with our buyers and actually getting through to a real person at the council!

Any developments waterlemon?
All ticking along nicely here I think, we have sent all our bumf off to the solicitor about our house, and hopefully will hear from our vendor's solicitor with the same. Had phone call from the EA to say our buyers would live to complete middle of October!!! I was a bit dumbstruck really- I think people are bound to be left disappointed with that tight a schedule. We have said we're not dragging our feet but we need to be realistic about the solicitor's turnaround. Let's see- but at least they are keen!

Afternoon All,
Wow thenewrage thats quick, but you never know, my Sister completed in 6 weeks in a chain of 3.

We took everything to our solicitor for our purchase on the 7th September and for our house the week before, the contracts are with both our buyer and vendor and our solicitor said today that she is working on us completing by 2nd December latest. I have everything crossed this is the case. We have 4 in our chain :- FTB - Our buyer - us and our vendor.

I hate not knowing exactly where everyone is at being in control !!

It does seem a bit quick doesn't it?
We have four in our chain too, our buyers are in rented, us, our vendor and her vendor. All I have been thinking has been lets get in by Christmas! I never thought hallowe'en! We still need surveys and everything done yet so it's highly unlikely but I did phone for some removal quotes today just in case!

You must be at a similar stage to us Anna, we have everything at the solicitor now but until they start looking into everything it's hard to tell how long it will take. Have you had a homebuyer survey on your purchase?

What a pain waterlemon. Reasonably common issue with ex-LA properties tho so hopefully it will be sorted soon.

I'm doing the same, I was thinking definitely by the middle of December. I have someone coming to quote us to move, but they can't come until early October - we are moving 200 miles so need someone from where we are going to to move us as I doubt it will all be sorted in one day.

The survey on our house was done last week and me and hubby are having a full structural survey on the one we are buying but not until this Thursday so I can't see anything happening soon.

I hope everything goes well for you - I didn't like that my solicitor told me earlier that she had never known buying and selling being so stressful for people as it is now. (gulp)