Sellers/Buyers roll call part 3. Who is still on this treadmill?

[MovingNextYearHopefully]

A slight name change for me, as I'm clearly not moving this year. Well, I am, but not into the house I'm buying.

Went to the development today, had a chat with the girls in the office & updated them. Hopefully we will be exchanging contracts next week should all go to plan. We found a nice house to rent, but its so bloody expensive I'm petrified! As long as we complete within our 6 month rental contract then all will be well, but if we don't then things will get ridiculously expensive!

@MovingThisYearDefinitely - yes chain length might be an issue. We know House B are ready to go ASAP (their buyer tried to drop the price on exchange and they said no). House A situation is not clear yet - they have been slow to engage and are not revealing much.

@MovingThisYearDefinitely Good news about the refund, hope you get to move soon - they mentioned you may be able to get in February now right?

Hope your offer on house A is accepted Sandy.

After waiting all day for a response from EA (as they had said the old lady was getting back to us today with her decision) I got an email at 17:59 just before they closed to say the EA has been out the office all day and playing telephone tag with the old lady; he said he caught up with her and she said she likes our house but has more queries with the stairlift contractors, so they EA asked if she received satisfactory answers from contractors what would she be prepared to offer to which she said ' it would be somewhat detached from the offer price of £250k '

So a lost cause to be honest; I have instructed the EA to flat out refuse anything that is under £240k, as it isn't worth our time and we aren't desperate to move.

After nearly 3 weeks since she first saw it (regardless of xmas) i should think this was enough time to determine if you could get a stairlift on our very straight/ wide/ sturdy staircase, so I have told EA to stop wasting his time chasing her and to just continue marketing our place to others.

@Ramsey1989 - that sucks! Do you have any more viewings booked?

It's an odd way of describing your thinking about an offer though. What exactly does 'somewhat detached' mean? It's the kind of thing my DH might say when he's playing hardball and doesn't want to reveal his true thinking. Maybe she's just a canny negotiator? I think you should carry on with viewings but you might find she comes back and surprises you.

@sandybayley No more viewings booked yet no.

I don't really know what 'somewhat detached' means in the context of this possibility of an offer; however from looking it up I expect the gist was that it would be a lot lower than the £250k asking price, so that is all I can take from it - the EA is open tomorrow but given his real slow/ cryptic emails I won't hold out for any kind of clarification tomorrow from him.

That could be her aim 'playing hardball' but I don't like playing silly games; she is dealing with someone who has next to know patience and only deals with straight forward responses, so this is why I have asked the EA to not bother chasing her anymore because it really does seem like a waste of time. I know my staircase is wider than the requirements for any stair lift; i know it is a straight/ standard length/ pitch, so i know for a fact any stair lift company could fit one on my stairs - however no company in their right mind would give a quote or definitive answer on this possibility without a site visit so she is wasting mine and her time.

Though we just got a viewing request for 3pm tomorrow through Yopa, however the EA is booked up so looks like I am showing round a 'Jake' who isn't selling anything and has mortgage in principle.

Happy new year all!

That’s so frustrating @Ramsey1989 Good luck for tomorrow.

The new year has brought a rush of viewers. We’ve had two today and have three tomorrow. Please, please can one of them buy the bloody thing??!

@ALadyofLetters i feel your frustrations!

It always seems the moment that im at the end of my tether and want to give up, things come out of nowhere to give us hope.

Had an email an hour ago to say the guy that offered before Christmas is now proceedable; not to big of a chain either, its:

• Guy who offered
• his buyer who is in rented and has cash buyer (aiming to complete March or before if possible - no onward purchase).

So i will phone EA tomorrow to discuss this and re-submit offer on our onward purchase if we accepted this offer.

Have told other EA that old lady has likely missed her chance on offering on our house, as we will likely accept this offer Monday.

No idea about guy im showing round tomorrow but its bit better than how it all stood this morning!

Yay @Ramsey1989 - I knew your luck was going to turn!

🤞

@Ramsey1989 things are sounding positive !

We also have some good news on our sale, buyer's mortgage has been approved, searches all back bar one and enquiries nearly all answered with just the last one being written up.

Can anyone advise me what else there is to do? My solicitor is ignoring me

What's the next stage after total nightmare?

As you know, we've been waiting on the re-issue of the lease for our garage since around October. It's still not though and our buyer is now waiting at her mums to come in here.

Our seller, quite rightly is sick of waiting for us, he accepted our offer on 13th August and has this week put the house back on the market, at £10K more!

We expect the paperwork to be back within the next 2 weeks and he says that if he's not sold it, we can have it at the original price agreed.

However, him putting it back onto the market has of course made us have a look at other options and we are viewing an absolute (and affordable) dream house tomorrow. The current new house has undergone some extensive renovation, there was loads of snagging that needed to done before completion, none of it has been done and I've a feeling it won't be.

I know what's going to happen tomorrow is that we're going to absolutely love this new house. What on Earth do we do? Our buyers mortgage expires at the end of January so we'll have to get out. The minimum rental is 6 months and it shouldn't take that long to buy the dream house. Do we stick with the original plan when we've found something much nicer?

I am beyond stressed!!!!!

@TiddleTaddleTat Once that last search comes back there may be more queries; other than that it would i guess just be the contracts to sign/ exchange and then at least a week before exchange and completion is recommended for mortgage funds to be received.

That is a difficult one TiddleTaddleTat as you would have to go through whole process again to purchase; make sure there are no charges from your solicitor for abandonment of purchase for the work they have already done, on the otherhand if your not happy with new build and dont feel its right anymore then just see how you feel after seeing this other house.

@TokyoSushi I wholeheartedly believe everything happens for a reason. If I was in your position and loved the new house this is what I would do. Continue with my sale as normal and move in to rented. Offer on the new property as a chain free buyer at a price that covers most of the 6 months rent.

We did something similar and got £5000 off of the vendors 'lowest price he was willing to accept'. We explained our situation and the benefits to him to have us ready when he is. Our rent for the same period is £5400. It is also far less stressful than being in a chain.

@makingithappen You sound very wise indeed, thank you.

@Ramsey1989 thank you, so I guess we may theoretically be ready to exchange by end of next week ?

When we bought the place we exchanged and completed on the same day, as it was vacant. It's again vacant and investor is buying to rent it out, so I hope we can do the same this time. If we don't complete by end of jan I am liable for 6 months service charge (£900!!) which my solicitor can claim back but highly preferable not to - I just really want it done.

@TokyoSushi I have found when buying and selling you really have to just take it one step at a time, and wait and see this new house and try and make a measured decision. I know it's difficult and there's some much emotion tied up in it. It's hell when you're in it but hopefully things will work out for the best.

Oh wow Ramsey. Congratulations! I hope you can get the figures to tie in with an onward purchase. 🤞

Hope you get news on your offer soon Sandy 🤞

Sounds very positive ALadyofLetters 🤞

Hopefully won't be too much longer Tiddle. I always worry when you don't hear though, that there is a problem you're being kept in the dark about. Can you get your EA to chase things?

Sometimes things happen for a reason Toyko. If the new house turns out to be better then do your sums & work out what you can afford. A 6 month let at the beginning of a transaction could work well. For us we were looking at about 3 months so are currently in a short-term holiday let, which is costing us just over 2k a month including storage costs. But we have no utilities or council tax to pay. Renting something for 6 months would have been more expensive. Wait & see if you like the house first, then look into options. It is a PITA moving twice, but if it gets you what you want then its worth it. I am glad we didn't buy the original house we were at point of exchange on. Let us know what you think after the viewing. It may look good on paper, but in real life may confirm how much you like the original house.

I'll definitely update, viewing tomorrow!

@MovingThisYearDefinitely We provisionally accepted offer of £245k today; buyer has sent proof of funds over and agent details to verify chain, so this is on the basis that all is in order and we can get an offer accepted on our forward purchase.

We put in offer of £326k for onward purchase; this is £6k under previous offer, which is the £3k less we had on our offer plus new EA selling fee and we see it as fair because the house 2 doors down from this one recently sold for £325k (or under) and it was bigger with another bathroom.

We will see what next week brings; buyer seems motivated and his buyer wants to be in no later than March, which is handy because this is when my mortgage offer expires (31st).

Congrats on accepting an offer @Ramsey1989. Serves Ms 'detached from asking price' right for messing around. I bet she is going to be gutted.

@makingithappen Well guess it is her loss if she was even ever going to offer; i realise a chain over a cash buyer is more risky, but its better a buyer who really wants it than one likely to slow down the process and probably throw queries left front and center - my thinking is she would have probably been difficult and this buyer has said he will do all he can to speed through process and make it easy for us.

Only time will tell if we get to exchange with this one, but its at least a possibility now of still getting house we want if they accept our new offer.

So pleased to hear there’s movement for some of you!
@Tokyo - your seller has been v patient but he’s relisted now, you don’t “owe” him anything so if dream house is a goer then doing as @moving suggests sounds like the way to go.

I think it’s game over for my purchase The vendor has been awol since early Dec. Got a message from EA today “there has been no contact from the vendors; I can only assume they don’t wish to proceed”
Is it just me or is this a very lacklustre (and annoying!) email? I have no idea if they’ve actually been doing any chasing or not bothered. Are they going to re-list the property ? Who knows! Trying to speak to them but think the guy I’m dealing with is off today 😠

@Fleabag123 - sorry to hear that. I can't imagine why someone would go AWOL after putting in an offer. Weird.

@Ramsey1989 - all sounds very promising. You were so despondent last night. Just shows what a difference 24 hours can make.

@TokyoSushi - I think you should go with your heart. If you get 'the feeling' tomorrow when you view the new house you should go with it. DH despairs of me but I make decisions about houses within about 30 seconds and rarely change my mind!

So, we've given House A until Monday morning to accept/reject our offer and have told them it's our best and final and we'll offer the same to House B if they reject. We do have another £25k to play with if needed but then that really is it. Have just cleaned our house from top to bottom as a distraction!

@sandybayley Hope offer goes through for you! I have cleaned my house many times as a distraction, even spent 4 hours re-arranging my loft too - anything to kerp my mind off this awful process so fully sympathise with you there!

It’s not that they’ve got awol after putting in an offer they’ve gone awol after accepting my offer.
Divorcing couple - wife is keen to proceed, husband is not happy with the price we agreed but also not speaking to EA.

Contemplating slightly upping our offer if it will get them talking again, but also not sure if that’s a foolish move...help!!

Tokyo I would definitely sell regardless and then buy. I am in rented as I had to move area despite not selling - and it was absolutely awful packing up a house we'd lived in 10 years - but I am much less worried about the next move as I have seriously decluttered, I know where everything is and it's much easier to work out what storage I'll need in a new house because of it. I'm not at all worried about packing for the second time and when I first decided to do this I thought it would be awful - but now I'm here I'm much more relaxed about making a second move.

I was previously in a chain when my sale fell through and lost my purchase but in retrospect it wasn't the right place and I was just desperate to get it all done. I think if you can sell first it will at least take the desperate panic out of the equation - especially given what a mare you've had - and you might find it easier to look and make the right decision. To some extent I am hoping that I can sell before anything new comes on that I like so that I can do exactly this - even though it will take longer! But then maybe - it'd be nice to just sell and buy quickly altogether! Either way - my total priority is getting the bloody place sold and for a price that will actually allow me to buy something else.

We had 3 viewings today on our place. No idea how they went yet and none of them were proceedable! But I am hoping it is indicative of a new mood for 2019 and people wanting to get on with moving. I'm, so so fed up with trying to sell. I actually wake up now every day with that dread feeling in the pit of my stomach and it takes me a while to realise it's the waiting for the house to sell that is causing it. And I really hope if we get offers that they are not completely ridiculous in the way that they were at the end of last year as I find that even more depressing that no offers!