Waiting to Exchange - Part 2, the wait goes on!

[TokyoSushi]

Hello! New thread, I don't think there's another one yet... shall we all give a quick update regarding where we're up to?

We:

• Went on market 12th June
• Sold for full asking 6th July too good to be true
• Had an offer accepted on DH dream home, (I didn't really like it but only suitable thing on the market)
• Our buyer pulled out 6th August
• DH dream home owner wouldn't wait and put straight back on market
• We went back on market on 7th August, reduced by £5K
• 4 viewings and 4 offers in next few days
• Offer accepted on 13th august
• Found both of our actual dream home and had offer accepted on 14th August
• Our buyer seems as firm as they can be
• Mortgage offer approved and searches commissioned on new house
• Our buyers seem very, very keen but I have a slight suspicion about how firm their buyer is
• Everybody hoping to move by half term

And so we wait....

Shared ownership isn't one thing, there are many different schemes. Has the case been referred to the company, their legal department or their solicitors? If the solicitors or legal department I would say they are doing a double check of the title documents. If the company itself I would say it is more of a funding issue. Some only have a certain amount of money in the 'pot' on a first come first served basis. Also is it a new build? I order to get planning developers can enter into a s106 agreement which obligated them to improve the local community. Sometimes new roads, schools, health centres etc. Often the s106 will have certain restrictions so, for example, the road and school must be finished before they sell the thirtieth plot. So if you are house number 30 and the road isn't finished you may have to wait.

Congrats @katzensocken, hope all goes well for your completion day and you settle in nicely with your reunited kitties!

I'm really hoping for some more progress next week - I responded to all of the buyer's enquiries within a day after them sending them through this week, and my estate agent has said we want to hear from them by the end of today... not hopeful for that but next week can be some fresh chasing!

Thank you. It’s a shared ownership resale so no issues with being built thankfully. My solicitor referred to the share date woenrship company rather than their solicitors or conveyers. They noticed that the mortgage offer had the wrong lease term on it and requested a new offer. So sounds like solicitors to me, but a bit on the dark. Thanks again for your help.

Chase your broker. The lease term affects the value of the property. Your solicitor has two clients you and your lender. They have to refer it back. Lenders are extremely slow and thorough at the moment.

Hi Iscream. I'm interested in the process with shared ownership too & how long it takes. Our buyers are selling a shared ownership (with housing association) flat to some first-time buyers. We are buying a new build. That is our complete chain. Our buyers buyers have applied for searches & had survey done, our buyers have applied for searches but are only having the valuation done next week, a month since we went sale agreed. I think our buyers are possibly a little optimistic because they want to complete October & we have agreed to break chain & move into rented if necessary as our house isn't due to be ready until Dec/Jan, so the longer the better as far as I'm concerned. I have heard that shared ownership HA properties can take longer to complete than a standard transaction. Is this the case in your experience? What pitfalls & delays are likely? Thanks.

@katzensocken congrats! About time haha. Hope moving day goes well!

Finally, some good news to report here-we've exchanged! All happened very quickly this afternoon after days of chasing solicitors and EAs. Completion set for next Friday. I've never known relief like it!

Shared ownership schemes almost always take a bit longer as there are more requirements, how much longer depends on the scheme. There have been so many different ones over the years so you have to read through from scratch each time. Some are almost like a second mortgage so don't add much if any extra time. The ones that involve staircasing or where a share of the property is being sold take longer. Much, much longer sometimes. The council ones seem to be the quickest.

Searches also vary massively. My local authority is taking three days at the moment. The next door local authority is taking about 25 days. The Vale of the White Horse estimated something ridiculous like 36 days, although it did actually come back quicker. Those are working days so once you add in weekends you are talking 7 weeks! It depends on the workload and staffing levels at each authority.

Is the valuation for the shared ownership scheme or the lender? Mortgages are taking ages to come through at the moment.

Leasehold properties usually take longer also. Often landlords/managing agents don't exactly rush to get the information to you and if you need to query anything it can be very difficult to get the information you need.

Please be wary of trusting developers' build dates, they aren't always accurate. Especially, as mentioned above, if you have very bad luck you could end up waiting for a road to be built before you can complete, even if the property is ready to move into.

I hate new builds. Some builders appear to think they are God. They try to impose unrealistic timetables, even if the property is far from complete. They also insist on clauses in contracts that no one else would get away with. Check your contract carefully and, if you exchange with completion to take place on notice make sure you insist on a long stop date.

Hello folks!

I've been quiet of late because there hasn't been anything remotely exciting to report, but I've always been lurking!

It's 7 weeks now since our offer was accepted and, so far as I can see, there's still no light at the end of the tunnel.

We rang the solicitor today, and they have received nothing from the vendor's solicitor as of yet. I'm beginning to get a little bit pissed off now. I know that the vendor's are buying a new build, but to be 7 weeks into the process and with an estimated completion date of end of November / beginning of December, and have nothing in the form of title deeds, etc?  Maybe this is something you could shed a bit of light on @Iscreamforbenandjerrys? Is this fairly common where new builds are concerned?

However, huge congrats to everyone who has had their exchange / completion! And hello to everyone new .

Congratulations TeamRocket. Good luck for next week.

Thanks for the info iscream. Very useful. We checked out our developer carefully & they seem to be one of the better ones. We are also very realistic about the build being likely to overrun & resigned to the idea of moving into rented. Currently our house is progressing to time & other people who have bought with the same developer have usually completed to time, so am keeping everything crossed ours does too. We go & visit every Saturday & catch up with the girls in the office for a progress report & take pics of the house to compare with last weeks. We are definitely going to do this at a timescale to suit us.

Hi IKnowThisMuch. In our case (buying a new build) everything has come through & being pushed through quickly. Developers usually ask for a 28-day exchange, hence the urgency, so the fact that nothing has happened in regard to this transaction is very puzzling. Could also be something as simple as the vendors have gone on holiday or are relying upon people to witness their signatures who are away on holiday. There are a lot of signatures required & this is actually the case for us with the second lot of papers we received requiring signatures. We received papers almost 2 weeks ago but our neighbours can't witness our signatures until tomorrow so it will be over 2 weeks before we get them back to our own solicitor even. We have kept them in the loop as to why. Has there been no communication whatsoever?

Moving - when we rang today, we were told that they hadn't received any documents from the vendor's solicitor at all. They had already been in contact with the EA, who advised that the vendor's solicitor were likely to send any documentation over in bulk, rather than piece by piece. I don't know if this is normal practice or not.

We're FTBs, so very green when it comes to all of this, despite trying to be as educated as possible.
My understanding is that, as we have nothing to sell, no Searches would be carried out on us? That would be carried out on the vendor? But I would still have expected there to be something underway, considering we've had our mortgage in place since early August and survey carried out around the same time.

They have already pushed back the estimated completion date - originally it was meant to be Halloween, but it's now pushed back by 4 weeks. I can't help but wonder are people being very lax because of the possibility of further delay?

Seven weeks is not normal at all. I get the sales memo, write to the buyer's solicitor, usually with a plan for searches.

At the same time I send the client a letter of engagement with the property forms to complete and return.

Once the property forms are back I draft the contract and send it out. On average this takes less than two weeks.

Delays are usually caused by clients not sending the forms back quick enough. Of it is a probate or attorney sale it would be understandable. Getting three different executors to agree and sign the forms can take a while. This someone buying on so that isn't the case here.

I've got a similar case on at the moment. I'm not at all confident this transaction will complete.

I would suspect the seller is either struggling to get funding, is having some kind of wobble (marriage woes, job worries etc) or really isn't motivated. Or they have a really crap solicitor. Your sales memo will have their solicitor's details. Google them. Are they local? Are they a conveyancing factory offering a cheap online service? My heart drops when I see certain firms on the other side. Cheap online companies vary considerably but they are all slow. The quantity of transactions they need to bill means delays are inevitable.

Speak to the agent and get them to find out what is going on. They can speak directly to the seller, your solicitor can't.

You pay for the searches to be done on the property. If you are getting a mortgage your solicitor will carry out a bankruptcy search against you but that is totally different and you get the result immediately.

If I was you I would be demanding reasons for the delay from the estate agent whilst skimming through rightmove to find a second choice. I'm not saying it will fall apart but I would want a plan b at this stage.

The usual freehold contract pack includes...

Contract -standard transaction takes maybe 10 mins tops to draft.

Title entries- 10 mins and £6 to download from the land registry.

Property forms and fittings list.

Referred to documents- can be downloaded 90% of the time with the title entries.

Any guarantees etc - If supplied by the seller.

Planning documents - mainly on newer properties and only if supplied by the seller at this point.

Grant of probate or power of attorney- needed before exchange so only if available.

Only the top three are really needed to send the contract out.

Thanks for this Iscream. This is more info than I've been able to get from either the EA or my solicitor in the past 7 weeks. They seem to be very much peddling the "everything's fine, this is all totally normal" and "everything is going to plan, the wheels are in motion" lines, but haven't really provided anything of substance. It took 4 phone calls to my solicitor to confirm they had received the sales advice and our mortgage application...

I won't lie, my heart has sank a little bit reading it, but I would rather be informed of what is normal than live in a bubble of "everything's fine".

I guess I'm at the "chase, chase, chase" stage now. I had this romantic notion that, seeing as the mortgage and survey were a breeze, I'd be one of those lucky few who wouldn't have any problems. Oh well.

Sorry to pee on your cornflakes but I usually find it's better to manage clients expectations than to allow things to drag out.

If this purchase doesn't go ahead it might be a good idea to think of a new solicitor. Ring around the local ones, ask friends for recommendations. You need to be able to trust your solicitor. Find an old fashioned local solicitor, someone you can have confidence in. The newer firms often have a low headline figure but add in sneeky additional fees so they don't work out much cheaper. My firm charges under £700 plus vat for a freehold purchase under 200k. You also get local knowledge that saves time and money. I know Bert who runs the private estate residents association and I know he off on holiday next week so we have to get a questionnaire sent off asap or it will take weeks. I know that even if the search provider recommends a flood search for Park Road, you only actually need one if you are at the end near the pond. I have copies of all the local tree preservation orders. I'm on first name terms with the woman at the county council who does the highways searches. I know all the quirks in the larger blocks of flats and how to get around them. A conveyancer miles away is working blind.

A general guide is to avoid any company that has 'law', 'lawyer', 'quality' or 'online' in their name and any firm over about 10 miles from the property.

Our purchase is finally ready to go, we had agreement to our fixtures and fittings purchase agreed yesterday (we're buying dishwasher, fridge and freezer from the vendor as they're not fitted and under counter which we don't have). Just need our sale to catch up but it really shouldn't be much behind. I'll be chasing the estate agent Monday morning for an update, we're so close to exchange and I need to get removals booked. It's so much harder as we're in Majorca on holiday until next Sunday and I suspect we'll be moving the week we get back!

zebrapig don't forget to organise your buildings insurance on the new house, you have to insure from exchange.

No, Iscream, you're absolutely right. I'd rather be informed than live in a bubble.

Our solicitor is local - it's a family solicitor on OH's side who has handled all the conveyancing for the family. However, I suspect he is partly to blame for things being so slow. I've been reliably informed that the solicitor is "very laid back". But still, nobody has had any issues in terms of getting the completion done in time.

I'm by no means an expert, but I'm sure they could be doing something while they await documentation from the vendor's solicitor? 🤷🏻‍♀️

Thanks Iscream - I've already got the quotes saves ready to hit purchase when we do finally exchange!

We've had an email saying our vendors are officially pulling out as they want to remarket in the spring because they think they will get.more money then good luck with that one.... so I guess I don't belong on this thread any more!

Oh wow. I'm so sorry RangerLady. Silly silly people, they will undoubtedly regret this ridiculous decision.

Anyone got any news this week? Our chain is currently is teetering with no end in sight (it feels like). I've said it before but I hate this process

@RangerLady are these the same people that said a couple of weeks ago they were going to pull out bc they were only looking casually and hadn't found anything? What happened after that?

Bit of a surge forward today, searches have come back, mortgage deed is signed, enquiries have been answered, surely it can't be that long now!!

Well before they had just said they couldn't find anywhere but were "kind of " still looking, but would sell us the house if they found somewhere. Now they've officially dumped us due to being greedy. I'm seeing 5 properties this week and 2 of them I'm very excited about so fingers crossed!