In a Chain Support Thread Nov2017

[YogaDrone]

Congrats to those who have exchanged and are moving soon.

Fingers crossed to those hoping to exchange soon.

Come vent your property chain based frustrations and joys here.

Previous thread is HERE

Congratulations HoneyB!

Tilly I agree you need to really have a long, hard think. There will be compromises with both house A and B, and only you will know really which are the compromises you'd rather make. I know £1200 is a lot of money but I guess if you end up really regretting not getting house A then it's an amount that could be potentially worth losing. I agree with Lazy though - try and see if you can suss out why the other sale fell through.

Busy week here. Chain now complete and have memorandum of sale documents etc. Bit of a balls up with our mortgage lender though. Last we heard from them (late November) they had all the documentation they needed and would be instructing the valuation survey in hopefully the next week or so. Anyway I never heard anything so I e-mailed our broker to chase them on Weds. Turns out they changed their minds and decided they needed some additional documents before they instructed the valuation survey, but never informed either us or our broker, so no-one knew! I have however kicked up a bit of a fuss about the delay not being our fault since they hadn't told us, and they documents they want I've had to order from our bank, so that's going to take a few days to arrive, and then it'll be the Christmas break etc, so it would mean not getting the survey until next year probably. Since I had a strop about it being their fault however they have since agreed to instruct the valuation survey whilst awaiting the documents, which is good, so fingers crossed it can get done before everything shuts down until next year!
I've also sorted out this week getting a homebuyers survey done, which is being done on Monday. That was a considerably easier and quicker process of just phoning a surveyor and sending them some money! (We looked into 'upgrading' the valuation survey from the mortgage lender to a homebuyers survey so we only had to get one survey done on the house we are buying, but they quoted £5000-6000 for the survey upgrade. WTF)!

I think I need to chase what's going on with our buyers (very slow couple) as well next week. I've heard nothing other than they've instructed a solicitor, and that was 3 weeks ago. I was expecting to have had a call about their mortgage company about doing a valuation survey on this house by now, but I've heard nada.

Yeah I spoke to the EA and apparently the survey flagged up possible need for a re-wire. He made them sound like over cautious FTB. Said vendor had for a new circuit board or something. They've also inflated asking price which was 167 to now 'offers in excess of' 170. It's basically got nicer fireplaces and a slightly more desirable road. I'm leaning to stick it with house B...

I've been away with work for two days so the solicitor hasn't had the pleasure (sic) of my contacts recently. She did, however, answer our note about what was still "unsatisfactory" and it's three listed building consents. Two out of the three were from prior to lovely Vendor's purchase, so makes me wonder how they managed to complete if these consents are as critical as my solc. seems to think they are. I'm trying not to get stressed [sigh]

Tilly - I agree with the others. If I were you I would be asking hard questions of the EA as to why the sale fell through. How far along the purchase process are you? Is House A on with a different EA than House B? Be aware that the EA's do seem to talk to each other so if you do go and view House A, it's very possible that House B's EA will hear of it and wonder what's going on!

KitKat I swear that lack of, or unclear, communication channels are the main bane of property chains. I'm glad you managed to persuade them to go ahead with the valuation survey while they wait for the additional paperwork, you must be very persuasive whilst stropping .

£5-£6 THOUSAND? Cheaper to have several independent surveys!

Good luck with chasing VSC!

Perhaps that's why they contacted your DH Cats? They knew he would be less likely to object!

Hooray Honey! At least you can have a calm weekend now

Good luck with the specialist MrsJW . Still seems weird that the vendor is insisting there has never been a leak

Any news on your survey Lazy?

Kit they must have made a mistake, surely?! You can get a full structural all singing all dancing survey for between £1200-£1500!! We had our valuation survey upgraded to a home buyer's report on our previous (failed) purchase. The cost of the upgrade was £300.

Yoga How frustrating, but take comfort from the fact that your solicitor is wanting to make sure you are fully protected. You don't want to be on the receiving end of finding out she's done a shoddy job and missed something if you decide to sell up in later years...

Our valuation came back fine and yippee we also have our formal mortgage offer - which only took a week! I am genuinely astonished about how easy and quick it was to sort out compared to the last lender we were going to use. We're now waiting for contracts to be reviewed and searches to come back.

There are a lengthy list of queries because it's not a straightforward property , but that was part of the compromise so we knew what we were getting into. I' hoping we can motor through the queries in short order - fortunately the EA on the other side seems to be quite helpful, so far.

I'm writing this sat in my lovely new home! Moving day was abit of a nightmare. We were out of our house by 1230, dropped keys off and off to our new house for just after 1 to find our vendors not even halfway moved out.... it was 330 by the time they were gone. It took the shine off the day somewhat but I'm over it now and very happy with the new place! Good luck to everyone still waiting - it will happen xx

Congrats Mollie! Wishing you many happy years in your new home

i went back to see house A today and have decided i'm sticking with house B. could see moss growing on the utility room roof flashing, dodgy looking gutters, windows needing replacing and circa 1970s fusebox....

it's such an anxiety inducing time of year anyway isn't it?!?

congrats Mollie, must feel wonderful!

Finally exchanged yesterday (supposed to be Monday, but got delay from the LR), house clean Friday, and move out Saturday. Packing and organising for the move now.

Good news about the survey and mortgage confirmation Lazy. Fingers crossed that the rest of your enquiries plus the searches are sorted quickly and the rest of the process goes smoothly.

I know what you are saying about the conveyancing being thorough , and I agree. I guess my frustration is because I was under the impression that all the paperwork was complete for our purchase and we were just waiting for the new purchasers to catch up. But we're now in the position that the buyer's solicitors are chasing us!

Congratulations Mollie Wonderful news I hope you will be very happy in your new home.

I'm glad that you've made your decision Tillys.

Best of luck Zoe

Yeah I know I thought it was odd! But our mortgage broker got the figures and said our mortgage provider wanted £5000-6000 for a survey upgrade. His take is that they clearly don't want the hassle of doing it, and so have just priced it as such a level that no-one would bother with it! The good news is that I have today had confirmation that our mortgage valuation survey is being done on Wednesday, and our (privately arranged!) homebuyers survey is being done today. So progress is being made! However very little noise at all from very slow couple who are our buyers which makes me a bit twitchy. I've phoned our EA twice to see if they know what is going on in terms of the valuation survey being done on our current house etc for our buyers, but they haven't been that helpful. I get the sense they are already in Christmas wind-down mode so probably not worth doing much chasing now until next year. Our solicitor packs up on Friday lunchtime until next year as well, so I suspect they will be similar, so thinking I'll just do the same now and sit at home with my bottle of Baileys and get back on it in January. [santa]

Congratulations Mollieben!

Glad you've made a decision which you are happy with Tilly. How is your purchase on house B progressing?

Great news on the exchange Zoemelb! Busy few days for you!

Great news about your formal mortgage offer Lazy!

I hope you manage to get through all the conveyancing hell soon YogaDrone!

Hello All,
I just tried reading up, and the thread has grown since I was last here!

Just stopping by, post completion amidst boxes, to say congratulations to all who have exchanged, those are soon completing, and best of luck to everyone else who is outside of those groups.

Welcome to all the new ones, may your journey be smooth.

Raaraa, Yoga, Zoe, Kitkat, Lazy, how are you all doing?

Frescoed, congratulations!

hi dudes - in the midst of a week long move it seems.

we completed last week and have a week overlap with our rental so we've decorated two rooms (were pink and purple - now gloriously brilliant white) and have started a third - our room which has a feature wall which is baby poo yellow/brown. I couldn't put my finger on it until yesterday when we had covered up all the yellow around the rest of hte room and it hit me - its the colour of shit! its good though and its the right house and I'm pleased we are going.

anyhoo - we are a bit in limbo as we are living between two houses with half our stuff here and half there and more moving over each day following a slight mix up with our removal company when it appeared I hadn't actually confirmed we wanted to use them and then the dates were taken by someone else. ahem. this does give us time to get the decorating done though and finish out school a bit closer.

oh and one of my DS has just come down with chickenpox - what epic timing!

You may well have the homebuyers report before Christmas then KitKat - something to read whilst necking sipping your Baileys

Hey Fialor and Raaraa - congratulations on your new homes

Removals date mix up is a recurring nightmare I'm having at the moment Raaraa - how did you cope? I guess having the week cross over was the saviour A feature wall the colour of baby poo? People are deeply strange

I hope your son feels better soon - calpol and calamine time (that's calpol not gin!)

Two things I've learned from these threads is that nothing gets done if you don't chase and that open and clear communication is the best policy.

With that in mind, I have "kicked some ass" this morning - terse email to my solicitor asking in a more polite but very firm way "WTF is going on and what needs to be done to get some meaningful progress"? I've also spoken to our estate agent who has spoken to purchaser (who is an employee of the vendor's EA) to apologise for the delay and make it clear that we're waiting on three bits of paper from the 1980's from the council and any pushing the vendor could do would be helpful. This has the double effect of letting our purchaser know that we are still engaged and attempting to move forward and, if our vendor isn't aware of the delay, making them aware that we're offered to pay for indemnity to get things moving. Grrr.... feeling all empowered now [swink]

Stormy is meant to complete this week as I remember - hope all is going well Stormy

Hey fellow chain gang. I've had a 2 page letter of queries from my buyers solicitors. Loads of nitpicky stuff. Apparently I'm supposed to supply a fensta certification for a new front door I had put in in 2015. It was Yale doors who did it. They went bust shortly after. I've got no certificate. What do I do??!

jobergamot look on the Fensa website to see if your front door was been registered before the company went bust. If it has, you can obtain a duplicate certificate for around £12.

Absolutely shattered having spent hours on the phone. Still here, still battling away - and now racing the calendar having found out our buyer's mortgage agreement expires 3 weeks earlier than he thought. Obviously the festive period is going to be such a great help in trying to pull the rabbit out of the hat!!

However we are giving it our best shot, but to say I am tired is an understatement. Apologies for lack of check-ins with people - hope you are all doing OK

my progression is obviously hampered by Xmas. I really wanted to have exchanged contracts pre-xmas with my buyers as I am worried about them finding something else in the new year when everyone puts their house on the market....

so much anxiety about incurring costs for bugger all and not being able to control a damn thing.

good to hear from some people tho that progress is made and completion does happen.... ;) x

Tilly - I am told by my EA that things are dead right now and tend to stay dead until the end of January when everyone gets paid again. So try not to panic too much.

We had one of "those" days yesterday too - lots of to-ing and fro-ing and toy throwing by lovely vendor. Finally we managed to speak to our solc and it transpired that their solc. had fed them incorrect info - or it had got lost in translation somewhere.

We could have had it resolved much earlier but we couldn't get hold of our solc. Finally spoke to her a 5.30pm last night!

So now it looks like we won't exchange before Xmas. Vendor's solc. has to provide one confirmation in writing (a sort of indemnity) which he has said verbally but is reluctant to put in writing. Our purchaser's solc. has to confirm that they are ready to exchange.

I always knew buying a listed building would be more complicated in terms of conveyancing than a non-listed but this is really dragging on now. Like Tilly I'm worried that our purchaser is starting to think about looking elsewhere.

I hope you get some progress this week Lazy

Well we almost exchanged yesterday - indemnity was supplied and solicitor provided their final report. I got insurance sorted and everyone was ready. Then, at the last minute, our purchasers lender decided they weren't happy with the declaration that Ms purchaser had been fully released from her previous mortgage and needed further assurance from the other mortgage company which isn't going to happen before New Year

Once purchasers mortgage company are happy we are 100% ready to exchange. I guess that's progress.

Merry Christmas fellow chain dwellers and to those who have moved I wish you a very happy first Christmas in your new home

Bloody hell Yoga how on earth has a lender left that kind of decision until the last minute?! However if that's all you are waiting for then FX that you will be good to go when everyone starts back on 02/01/18.

Dunno Lazy - everyone (including purchasers and their solc) were ready to exchange. No idea why the mortgage company have left it so late to decide they need more info. Hopefully it'll all be sorted early Jan. as everyone is keen to get on with it now. My new year's resolution will be to never move again!

Anyway, I'm taking a week off from worrying about it and tonight I'm breaking out the mulled wine and mince pies. Christmas gluttony starts here!

Sorry to hear about everything Yoga. We completed yesterday, but we let the seller stays for extra 2 days (it's our solicitor's fault letting us know last minute that we have to complete on the 20th instead of 22nd because their finance person goes for leave from 20th). Anyway, our current seller is reliable so now just doing all the packing, and wait till tomorrow to pick up the key. Have organised the cleaner to do a full tenancy clean, and removals a day after. Hope everything will go according to plan.

Sorry hear that @Yoga- you're almost there and miles ahead of the rest of us! Make the most of your last Christmas in your current house.

@Lazy- have you had an update? @zoemelb- must be so good to have made it to your new house- congrats!

We're still at the enquiries stage. Solc's still have 2/28 buyers enquiries to go through which'll most likely be done in the new year.

For those who have exchanged/completed- did your lenders ask for updated payslips, etc. before releasing funds for completion? What is standard practice before completion?

The job I was in at the time of applying for a mortgage (Locum) came to an end a month ago- we'd hoped to have completed by then but then our chain collapsed. I have another job lined up for January already but at a slightly lower salary. It's a fixed-term contract. I'm scared the lender might ask for an updated payslip for my old job.