Do home owners/sellers ever really move into rental to break the chain or do most make it up just to sell?

[mumofoneortwo]

Hi,

So we're SSTC and our buyers are BTL investors. We had an offer on a house accepted a month ago and the vendors have just had an offer accepted on a house, which is apparently chain free, as they have said they will rent.

We thought that this should be an easy, shortish chain, but we obviously know things are never that easy in the world of house buying/selling.

Anyway, had a meeting with our solicitor today and we told her about the chain and she threw her head back and laughed when we told her about the vendors idea to rent. She said "that's what they all say, but its never that easy and they'll usually 'randomly' find a house they want to buy and then the chain becomes longer and more complicated".

Is this true? I suppose I can imagine it happening if someone is desperate to sell, but is it really as common as our solicitor says?

She also winced when we said that our buyers were BTL and said that they're the most awkward of all buyers

So after feeling quite positive about the chain and the fact that things seemed to finally be moving forward, I'm now back to feeling on edge.

Thoughts and experiences very much appreciated.

TIA

I had to do it this time because I moved four counties away. I managed to get a short term let but if it's for 6 months then you have to pay the full 6 months even if you move in 2. At one point I was paying mortgage and rent for 3 months and I was properly pissed off. I wouldn't recommend it.

We rented between one of our moves, we didn't know the area that we were moving to all that well and weren't sure that we would stay there so when we got a really good offer on the house we were selling we just went along with the buyer's timing.

It's worth doing if the market isn't moving upwards too rapidly and there is good availability of rental. It put us in a strong position as buyers and we got a good deal on a place where the sellers were moving abroad so needed quite firm dates.

Yes we are selling and definitely going into rental. Although my experience is that I wouldn't reccommend it as everyone else in the chain has a definite destination and so they all feel free to mess around with exchange and completion dates whilst we have no idea where we are moving to and can't make any plans

We’re doing that now partly cause we wanted to find the right house and wasn’t 100% where we wanted to be. Has been well worth doing.

It was definitely a lie when our vendors gave us this line.
Like your solicitor says, about a week before we were supposed to exchange they ‘happened’ to find a property they wanted to buy and therefore asked us to wait a while longer.
Pissed me right off!

I’ve sold a lot of houses and have genuinely sold one and rented for a bit while I looked for my next house. But, renting is expensive and takes planning, you don’t just sell a house in the morning and move into a rental that afternoon. Just like buying you need to find a suitable place, then go through referencing, pay a huge deposit and rent, move your stuff etc.

I’d be wary tbh, on occasion it’s taken me almost as long to rent a place as buy one (by the time I’ve found a good house, previous tenants are out, the place has been cleaned, the admin done)

I’ve also had ‘cash buyers’ meaning a remortgage not actual cash in the bank, no quicker.

We fully intend to rent as we won’t even start looking for a house until we have a firm offer on ours and things are proceeding well.
We’re doing it this way for one reason - we hope it will make it easier on us after seeing the horrendous stress and even heartbreak some friends have gone through when selling and buying in our weird English system.

Of course, it’s not like that for everyone but we just want to make it as easy as possible. If we have to rent for, say, six months and move out in less time I suppose we'll have to suck it up.
But luckily we are mortgage free so there won’t be two monthly payments to be made.

Thanks for all the replies.

You've put my mind at rest a little.

Definitely came out the meeting feeling a bit deflated, so it's good to hear that this does genuinely happen quite a bit.

I’ve rented between properties before just to keep the chain going and to get some work done on the property I was buying before I moved in with furniture. Yes, an extra cost but it was within my moving budget and saved a load of stress. I wouldn’t have a problem about doing it again in the right circumstances.

Yes we did it, bit a hassle but cut down stress so would do it again.

I’m a conveyancer and yes people do do it.

we sold, then went into rented for nearly a year, trying to find the right place, so it genuinely does happen.

However when I bought my first house, the vendor's solicitors insisted that she'd be moving in with her daughter as soon as the deal was done - at which point she feigned total ignorance of ever having said such a thing (possible: the agents had had her house on their books for 2 years and were keen to make the sale), and she lingered for another 5 months, house-hunting from the comfort of her own home.

It depends on how accommodating your sellers/buyers are! As I'm a pushover and was desperate to move we (2 adults, 3 kids, 2 dogs, 2 cats, 2 rabbits and 2 guinea pigs) moved into rented/with parents four times to accommodate our buyers as the house that we were moving into wouldn't have been ready - shortest period was 4 weeks and longest was 9 months. When marriage broke down and I needed to move into smaller house with the kids I was determined that the seller could move out this time but no, we ended up living with parents again for 6 weeks whilst seller got herself sorted out co-ordinating her sale and purchase to complete on the same day

The only plus side of selling then renting/sofa surfing for a few weeks is that you often have a massive bank balance for the duration and it makes you feel kind of good even though you know its only temporary

People do it all the time
I would change solicitor if I were you, she sounds awful

We've done it twice to prevent being in a chain. It's worked really well for us.

She's right. Years of working in estate agency and plenty of people said they would move into rented if they sold, hardly any actually did. Main reason being that most rentals require 6 month contract and they don't want to commit to that in case their dream house appears.

I did this when I needed to move to the new location within a deadline. Expensive as I ended up renting longer than intended as my initial sale fell through, and moving twice was a pain, but the downsides of not moving would have been far greater.

Sorry to tell you, it was a BTL investor who just walked away when a potential problem came up with the house sale rather than waiting the 24 hours it took to solve it - my solicitor said she wasn't surprised as he was buying an investment not a home so didn't have any attachment to the house.

I did, we were moving a long way and the chain was long enough as it was. The pissing about came from a Daddy's spoilt princess near the bottom but that was another story...

however you are quite right, very few do. Little old ladies who will move in with their daughters are particularly not to be trusted, issued an ultimatum here when that game started. Fortunately she caved in. I think that there is no such thing as a chain free house unless it is a vacant rental or the previous occupant is dead.

We are moving into a rental as we are relocating. Yes it's going to cost a ridiculous amount of money but we need to move on as our children need to get settled into schools. There is a BTL investor at the start of our chain and now I'm all kinds of worried about what people on here have said. I hope it doesn't all fall through as this is our third time selling and it's always fallen apart at the beginning of the chain

These days most sales in my area miraculously appear to have no chain even when the current occupants are very much alive. Always moving in with the children /going into rental. Once the unsuspecting seller has shelled out on the searches and survey, the chain magically materialises.

These days most sales in my area miraculously appear to have no chain even when the current occupants are very much alive. Always moving in with the children /going into rental. Once the unsuspecting seller has shelled out on the searches and survey, the chain magically materialises.

We did and it was a mistake. We moved into rented (well...with my parents) in early Nov with the promise that our purchase would go in mid-dec. We finally completed last week and only because we threatened to pull out (over 4 months after our offer was accepted). There were 4 in the chain which was apparently what slowed things down. In hindsight I would have made our buyers wait (or been prepared to re-list our property).

My sellers did and I will be eternally grateful to them. I paid the asking price for the house and moved on the date that suited them; they agreed because wanted to avoid being in a long chain and my end was very simple and ready to exchange by the time I found my house.

Oh heck. We are exchanging contracts tomorrow, we are in rented, our sellers are buying from a household going into renting - is this all about to collapse?!

You can't believe anything anybody says.