Selfish sellers

[Whyisnothingeasy]

So basically, long story short we are buying a house. Only a little chain, first time buyers buying ours, we are buying a bigger house, the house we are buying going into rented while they look for something specific which don't come up often in a certain area. It was agreed from the start that top of the chain would go into rented.
Need to exchange by the start of Jan due to rental terms for first time buyers and mortgage offer for us.
Us needing to exchange by start of Jan has been known for months, which is why top of the chain agreed to go into rental rather than hold the chain up.
We are around a week off of being able to exchange and top of the chain have now found a house and are trying to put it through with our sales, effectively saying that it's vacant so they can exchange and complete in the next 3 weeks
I'm worried that after paying out loads of money in legal fees that they will not be ready to exchange when we are, and will hold us all up.
Legally where do we stand?
My only options are for the bottom of the chain to try and go into another short term rental while we wait for the top of the chain, while we try to get a new mortgage offer if ours isn't valid anymore (or a mortgage offer extension)
Or for everyone to pull out?
I don't understand how a seller can just stick another house on the top of our chain and get away with it?
So angry. Advice please.

If they had said they were buying a new property from the start then fair enough. But right from the start they have offered to go into rented so that everyone else can meet the deadline. Suddenly this has changed and they didn't even have the courtesy to tell the rest of the chain.
School wise 95% we would get in. We are one of the 5 closest houses (spread out from each other as quite rural). So even if there were 20 siblings we would probably get in.

Ask them to stick to the agreed schedule and move into rented, with the school situation and the mortgage offer, it is not worth the wait for you. If they do not agree, then pull out. (Easy to say from behind a screen... what an awful situation for you)

Deep breaths, put the anger aside. Dates shift all the time when buying and selling houses, they haven't done anything dreadful. The FTBs knew it was a risk if they gave notice before exchange, and you must have known it was a risk cutting it so close to the wire for school applications.

But remember this might all just be a big game of Chicken. They might just be trying it to see if you'll accept the delay, because it would suit them better. My guess is that if you push back strongly enough, and are prepared to walk away (which sounds sensible to me, gut wrenching as it is) you will win the game of Chicken and they will stick to your timescales. BUT it's a high stakes "game" and you can call it better than I.

Agree with the other PPs that you need to make the sellers aware if you really do have (and it sounds as you do) a fixed cut off and you will walk away if you miss it.

Personally I'd try to speak to the sellers direct as agents never really explain properly.

If the sellers aren't prepared to put up with the inconvenience/cost of moving twice, sadly there's nothing you can do but cross your fingers it gets done in time knowing you will walk away if necessary - but in fairness you ought to let your FTBs know that this is your plan.

If the sellers would move twice but don't want the cost of taking on a 6 month tenancy etc for a few weeks then it's possible that you (and your buyers perhaps) could think whether you could make some sort of offer to the sellers perhaps to split their storage costs with them if they're going to be in short-term accommodation for a few weeks. Not your responsibility to do this but it may just help get round things if it's cost and hassle rather than just not wanting the hassle of two moves close together.

We've just had a quote this morning from a removal company who said they would move stuff into storage for them for £500 and that includes a months storage. They said pass their number on if needed.
I would happily pay half of these storage costs if it meant they would move into rented for a month.
Also there's lots of air bnbs around here they could use for a month. It's just them agreeing to do it.
Don't see why they couldn't tho, as the original plan was move into rented anyway.
So stressful.

This happened to us. The top of the chain swore they were going to rent. Then they started buying a house without telling us.

The first we knew was when it all went wrong on the day of exchange. Which happened to be the day before completion.
We lost thousands.

Horrible as this is it is a business transaction. Seeing them as a selfish is not going to help you.

The point about the system is it gives everyone time to do their research and put things into place. I understand your frustration though. (I had a seller pull out at 5pm on the day of exchange. I was 2 days off giving birth due to delays on their side. No communication whatsoever - just nothing!!)

Be practical as others have said - and hope for the best!

I really feel for you!
We had a very similar thing happen and we didn't even have schools to consider!
I was so so stressed so I can only imagine how you must be feeling!
In the end our buyer delayed things aswell so the top of the chain had time to rush their purchase through!
Depends on how good their solicitors are, what their circumstances are regarding mortgage etc
Our searches took over 3 weeks so things like that can make a difference

I would be firm, if you miss the deadline for the school and have a very slim chance of your kids making the second round of admissions then you have nothing to loose?
Might aswell pull out if the chances are as low as you think?

Take a deep breath, ring your estate agent and solicitor and just see what they are saying!
Good luck

I'm an EA and can tell you that this happens a lot, but you can resolve it. Your Vendors found a property when they were looking for something specific so that means they'll really want it to go ahead. You should tell your EA that you're very disappointed to have found this out via your sol and unfortunately if they cannot exchange by X date ( I'd say before Christmas check when the sols close) you'll withdraw. They'll either agree to move out and stay with family etc or it falls apart, but there's a good chance they'll agree when faced with losing the property they want.

I think you can use the new address for a school place application if you’ve exchanged contracts, or that’s how I remember it, maybe ask them to exchange with you by the Jan deadline and complete later

The people selling to you are being selfish, yes.

They should be arranging quotes to store their furniture and paying that £500 for the privilege. As you say, there are always short term rentals, hotels and air b and b.

However, your Estate Agent should be dealing with ALL of this for you. They should be negotiating hard with their EAs. They don't want to lose the commission from the sale of your house and presumably the vendors EAs won't want to be losing their's either. And the vendors won't want to lose their sale to you! You hold all the cards here but get the manager or senior director of your EAs onto this. This is a complicated situation not to be handled by a junior negotiator.

I was coming on to say the same thing as Niknac to salvage the school situation, can you exchange early Jan, with a delayed completion? (I realise that won't help with the mortgage situation (although I think that is surmountable), nor with your FTB's situation).

But firstly you need to make it clear to your sellers that due to school admission deadlines, their house is only of interest to you if you can complete (possibly exchange, but don't mention that to them initially!) by early January.

We had to do that with a house we bought when we were the top of the chain. Our purchasers were fine and keen to move, but it was their purchasers who, having said they were cash buyers, decided they would instead like to cash in one of their golf courses (yes really) in order to fund the purchase. We were relocating across the country due to DH's work and said if we couldn't be there in time for the admission deadline, we'd take our house off the market, and DH would do a weekly commute. It all went through in the end, by the deadline - our purchaser's buyers used their original cash reserves, as agreed from the start.

At the moment, you do hold the power - they want to sell their house, and were prepared to move to rented. They now have found a dream house. If you pull out, they will lose their dream house. For the sake of £500 and a couple of weeks in a B&B they would be mad to lose their dream house. But they need to understand that the deadline is a deadline, and the sale is off if you can't meet it - that isn't an idle threat.

So I've offered to pay half of their storage costs. This has been accepted and hopefully we will exchange Jan and complete end of Feb.
They are very aware of the fact that if we do not exchange in Jan then we will not pay 50% storage costs and we will be pulling out.
So time will tell!!!

Spoke to mortgage advisors and an extension to our mortgage offer shouldn't be a problem, although there will be another arrangement fee of £300

I really don't understand why you offered to do that, but it's done now.

They want to sell and they want to buy! Those two transactions are worth an extra £500 to them.

Because £250 is worth it for no stress! It's like my husband said, in the great scheme of things, when you are paying out thousands, an extra £250 to make them leave their house early, put their stuff into storage, find a deposit for a rental, pay over the odds for a short term let and then move again, is not a great cost.
We would lose almost £1500 if we pulled out now, but they would lose an onward purchase. I worry that they could pull out quite easily if they chose to and we don't want that. We just want to exchange and complete when agreed.
I'm probably too soft and we can't particularly afford to be wasting £250 but hey ho.

Check with the LA that exchange is sufficient for schools admissions! It is for my LA, but not for all...

I've checked and checked again. You need a solicitors letter confirming you've exchanged and with a completion date on it (even if it's an estimated completion date) so fingers crossed. I'll be handing in that solicitors letter in person!

Great! As your DH says, in the overall scheme of things... And for me, that extra £250 would be worth it for the extra peace of mind over Christmas. Principles are all well and good, but life sometimes really is too short!

Keep looking.

The house isn't yours until you move in.

If and when you exchange contracts you can stop looking.

It does no harm to let the vendors know that as they have reneged on their previous statements, you will be looking for an alternative home.

I did say that @PigletJohn We could always look for a bigger house in the catchment area we are already in and just buy here instead fingers crossed this goes ahead. We are so close, yet so far!!!

I'm pretty sure you can make a school application based in exchanges contracts not completion

We started looking again when the people we were buying from started mucking us around. I genuinely went and looked at other properties with a view to buying them. Infact there is one to this day that I still wish we had gone for!

But us getting out there and looking (as in we looked at other properties for sale through their own agents as well as others) really focused their minds and the chain got moving again pretty quickly.

How did you get on?

I've just been in this exact situation!!
First time buyers buying our house, the couple we were buying from were going to move in with relatives whilst they found a bungalow.
Easy! Or so we thought!

After 2 or 3 weeks of radio silence from them and their solicitors, it turned out they had found a bungalow and were adding it into our agreement.
So our chain of three turned into a chain of nine and progress suddenly slowed.

We also had to apply for primary schools and said if it wasn't exchanged by Christmas we would pull out as there was no point moving if it was too late to apply for schools.

Finally (two months later than expected) we have completed and moved in. We fully expected it to fall through.

We said at the start if they found a bungalow it would make sense to add it into the chain. But the weeks of silence and not knowing what was going on added unnecessary stress to everything.