Looming lockdown limbo support thread

[PointyMcguire]

Thought we could do with a thread to rant, laugh, drink copious amounts of gin and whatever else it takes to get us through the madness of whatever new curveballs covid throws into the mix as we try to move house.

We’ve exchanged on our old house and are due to complete on Friday 13th (I was just asking for bad luck right?!) but we’re actually moving out next Friday and into a family owned holiday home for a month. We were hoping to exchange on the new house in mid November and complete before Christmas but god only knows how likely that is now. I’m relatively hopeful we’ll still be able to move during lockdown, but am pretty stressed about the potential impact another lockdown might have on the chain and how much time everything takes.

Anyone else in the same boat?

@PointyMcguire Oh no! I hope they switch it. That's what our sticking point has been. The first (wrong) mortgage was done as a desktop, but then converted to physical with a 2 week wait. I cried- and that was 2 weeks, let alone a month.

@MoirasRoses We're in the same position. Valuation this morning (and the bank should be prioritising this one as they messed up the first one). I know what you mean - the mental load of it all is horrible isn't it?

Can I join in please? We accepted an offer on our house two weeks ago and had an offer accepted on the house we want to buy last week. So solicitors etc have been instructed. Just nervous now that our sellers won't find a property (I agree that new houses coming on the market have just dried up since even a couple of weeks ago) and how long any chain will be above us as it's currently just our buyers, in rented, then us, then our sellers, then who knows...

Some relief that the property market is still supposed to be staying open but I'd heard too that searches are taking an age. Hoping we can still get completed by the end of March...

I am totally stressed out was supposed to be exchanging this week but our vendors solicitor is still awaiting the last few enquiries I am fed up of chasing up things , their enquiries have been going on for over 3 weeks now how much longer will they take out buyers are getting fed up as they are renting and want to be out

No progress for us today unfortunately...
We've signed contracts for the sale and purchase, as have everyone else in the chain so I've no idea what the timescale is from this point- very frustrating.
I've emailed and asked for an update so hoping for more positive news tomorrow!

Our estate agent has said they are contuining to stay open as per guidance so that should be fine as we are under offer. Heard nothing from anyone for a week and asked our EA, he said it should be our solicitor sending us the paperwork so chased them and they will e-mail it. EA says searches are taking 5 weeks and he says buyers won't order until they get our paperwork.

Well I have great news. It's been a crazy 2 weeks. Sold the house in a week and the next week had an offer accepted on our forever home. Short chain with our next purchase probate while the people buying our house are exchanging this week.

Crazy times. Just hoping I'm not making a mistake with my house purchase

@lboogy congratulations! Amazed you’ve got to offer in a couple of weeks. Where we’re buying searches are taking the best part of 6 weeks and the 2nd lockdown has meant getting our official mortgage offer will take even longer now. Hope everything goes smoothly with the probate house.

Thanks @PointyMcguire. Fingers crossed you get the mortgage offer soon

We have exchanged this morning and complete in two weeks so here's hoping for smooth progress from here! Good luck all

I'm amazed by some of these timescales!! We are selling a house & buying a flat. The house went on the market just before lockdown. Eventually got an offer on our house, and found a flat we wanted to buy in July. It's still dragging on now, and our solicitor told us yesterday we still can't confirm a date because of a legal admin error to do with the flat.
At this rate, we'll be lucky to move by Christmas!

We accepted an offer on ours in early July and offered on our purchase a week or so later. Completion date of 20th November so around 16 weeks, I think that's quite good too!

We've decided to break the chain and move into temporary accommodation.

We've agreed to complete 16th November which will be 1 day shy of 8 weeks since we accepted the offer. Pretty speedy in the current climate I reckon, assuming it all goes to plan! Keeping fingers and toes crossed!!

So despite a bit of a nightmare with our packers on Friday we are now moved out and happily settled in our temp accommodation. We have cleaners going in next week to deep clean and then completion on Friday. Feel a bit guilty as had planned to leave our buyers a bottle of wine and a card but life well and truly got in the way this week.

How’s everyone else getting on?

Oh no what's gone wrong with your packers? We've got the packing service too. We're really hoping the majority is sorted on packing day so it's just a case of moving on the actual day.

It's really thoughtful having a deep clean for your buyers, how kind.

@Baxdream they were just a bit rubbish with communication. They had 2 jobs on Friday morning, ours and one other. Unfortunately they ended up waiting around for hours for the keys to the other house which wouldn’t be a problem in itself had it not been for the fact they had 4 staff over at that job waiting for the keys and just one poor bugger at ours trying to lug 3 bedrooms worth of stuff into a van. Tbf he was a bloody trooper, but it did mean we didn’t lock up and leave until 8pm and then had a 4 hour drive to our temp place.

I am seriously worried about our chain. We accepted an offer on our house and also on our purchase on the 2nd of October. Our buyers are the start of the chain. A few houses up and the chain is still not complete with the top house ‘still looking’. How long does this go on for?

Oh no that doesn't sound fun! Our packers are coming Saturday and we move on Monday. I'm hoping where it's on different days they'll get the lions share done on Saturday. We're happy to get bedrooms cleared out apart from mattresses if it means we get into the new house nice and quickly!
It's my first experience of a removal company so I'm quite excited

Ah yeah ours started Wednesday afternoon but for some reason left all the actual box moving until Friday. Don’t get me wrong it was still a damn sight easier than us doing it all ourselves, I think I just didn’t anticipate how long the actual moving of the boxes would take. Best of luck for your move x

@checkedcloth it’s a bit of a how long is piece of string question at this point as it’ll depend on the houses further up the chain and what those chains look like. All I can recommend is getting your mortgage sorted early as we waited for our vendors to find a house before we did and now it’s looking like our valuation will be the thing that holds up the chain.