How long after searches back?

[GorgeousLadyofWrestling]

I know...I know... no one can say for certain. But I am impossibly excited because I genuinely never believed we’d be able to buy our own home.

Situation is: we’re FTB. The property is empty - vendors live abroad. Offer accepted Aug 31. Solicitors appointed - vendor solicitors have sent draft contract. Searches done and back so my solicitors are compiling the search report for us to sign.

We have our mortgage offer sent to us but my solicitors don’t have it yet.

Spoke to my solicitors today - tried to extract ballpark timeframe as totally inexperienced but he refused to give estimate (fair enough!). He says we’re in a good place and about 50% done in terms of progress.

All being equal...can any give a guesstimate of time frame now? I’m dying of excitement, really trying not to get my hopes up, really trying hard to be patient. I don’t actually mind if it takes X long - I just want to start to hope that we can do this and own our own home. I’ve been holding it in for so long and it seems soooooooooo close now!

depends if solicitors and vendors get off their arses. Nobody does anything from a week before Christmas (wish I'd had a job like that!) so keep pushing or you'll trip over the season of tat.

you pay that solicitor so ask what else needs to be done.

get ready: ring round and get insurance quotes that you can trigger from exchange. If you are in a rental do NOT give notice until exchange. Try and get completion NOT on a Friday, money moves quicker and removals are cheaper.

Can you give some more information please - impossible to discuss timescales without knowing more about the property and the stage you are at?

Is the property registered at Land Registry?
Is the seller the same person(s) named on the title?
Is the title Absolute?
Is the property: leasehold? Freehold with a management company? Freehold?
Is the property in a conservation area? Listed? How old is the property?
Have there been any alterations or extensions?
Have you had a survey done? Any issues?
Have your solicitor approved the draft contract?
Have your solicitors raised any enquiries?
Have the sellers responded to the enquiries?
Were the responses satisfactory?

After searches are back your solicitor will now raise some enquiries with the vendor's solicitor, essentially a load of questions asking for further info about the house, requests for documentation etc.

How quickly these are answered depends on how efficient the vendor and their solicitor are.

In terms of time it might be 2 weeks, it might be 2 months. An army marches at the pace of its slowest soldier, same with a house purchase, the time taken is determined by the speed of the slowest component.

I've never heard of a solicitor compiling a search report for the buyer to sign.

Maybe I had that bit wrong about signing the searches report?

The property is a ground floor purpose built flat - ex council built in the sixties. No extensions, not listed, not anything special like that. Freehold. Survey all fine.

Solicitor said the searches all looked fine in terms of issues being raised.

Vendor is keen to get it sold so I hope/ don’t think they’ll hold anything up.

Check in case you need to give the mortgage offer to your solicitor - im not sure the mortgage co send them to solicitors.

A ground floor purpose built flat will be leasehold not freehold.

Mortgage companies do send mortgage offers to the solicitor, but it does need to be addressed correctly. Do not send a copy of your offer to the solicitor- this is your copy and differs slightly from the one the lender sends to the solicitor and that is the one your solicitor requires.

The sale of memorandum says it’s share of freehold? Definitely not leasehold but I’m totally green so don’t get the distinction between share of freehold...and freehold.

Memorandum of sale?? See - not much idea of what’s what. Trying to get myself up to speed on it all but it’s so confusing.

Ah - share of freehold is different to freehold.

There will be a lease, but you will jointly own the freehold with the other residents.

Ah. I’m guessing that will take longer then.

My only concern is worrying that the vendor will get fed up.

The sales memo (or mem of sale!) is a piece of paper from the EA detailing the property address, sales agreed price and details of vendor and their solicitor and the buyer and their solicitor. It is not a legal document and may have inaccuracies. It is the solicitors job to weed out all the facts and legalities.

A share of freehold means you will either own a share in the management company that maintains the common and shared areas, or that you will be a freeholder along with up to 3 other freeholders and will have your named entered onto the freehold title together with the 3 other freeholders.

Your flat will be leasehold though. Have you received a copy of the title? It will say there that it is leasehold subject to a lease dated....

Leasehold conveyancing will take longer. The sellers need to provide a leasehold pack and your solicitor will need to review this pack along with the lease to ascertain service charges and ground rent clauses. How long is left on the lease?

Panicking now because of the lack of clarity around freehold but spoke to the estate agent and my broker. Estate agent says the vendor is very relaxed so not to worry.

100 years left on the lease. I think this lack of clarity is completely my mistake for not realising there was a difference. Just need to speak to solicitor to bring them up to speed ASAP. Hope it doesn’t mean we need a new mortgage offer.

Your solicitor will know it’s leasehold because of the draft contract pack they have received from the sellers solicitor. Similarly the lender will know it’s a Ground floor flat from their valuation so don’t panic.

100 years remaining on the lease term is good.

To try to manage your expectations, the legal work has just begun and it is too early to predict a timescale. Leasehold will be longer and management companies and/or the council are not the quickest at answering queries. All you can do is be patient and try to get updates from your solicitor. The EA is not party to the legal work and therefore cannot give accurate updates - he can speak to all parties and pass on any information. He will not know if the information given to him is the truth and EA are notorious for embellishing facts and/or winding everyone up with threats of remarketing etc.

I always work on around 3 months from acceptance of offer to exchange of contracts (when it's finally all signed - the completion date comes afterwards and is agreed at exchange, and is the date that you own the house).

Congratulations, it's all very exciting! Your vendor will expect this kind of timescale too - no-one else will be able to move it along faster. I do advise keeping in touch with your solicitor and the estate agent, and keep things moving - the person that makes their voice heard gets pushed back up to the top of the pile.