Chain of 6. So worried and it’s making me ill.

[Worriedhomemover]

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone has any advice or positive stories of a longer housing chain.

Our buyer viewed our house in July! We accepted an offer. DH actually showed them around on the second viewing and he said ‘we’re in a really good position and have exchanged’, our estate agent presented the same information to us. All great. We accepted the offer based on that, gave them a few grand off.

We then have an offer accepted on our new place saying we are in a short chain (they are chain free so we are number 5).

We then found out our buyer has 3 people behind her. We were angry and wanted to pull out but decided to keep going as this is our dream house and we don’t want to lose it.

The first purchase in the chain fell through and was re established in early September. We are still waiting and haven’t exchanged. Apparently they are still waiting for a search to come back.

I feel sick. This is a relocation for us and for various reasons we needed the sale to go through quickly.

I’m so worried that something else will go wrong. Our estate agent has been great (feel awful for her as she seems to be organising the whole chain’)

I almost want to pull out, but we’ve come this far and our vendors have been amazing- they have had a sale fall through previously and I don’t want to do it to them again.

Who had actually completely on a bigger chain? Any survival tips? I can’t relax at all. We started packing things into boxes thinking moving was imminent and then all of a sudden they’re saying ‘hopefully before Christmas’. There is just so much uncertainty!

@Watermelon39

Sorry to hear that *@Fluffybutter* . Why would they pull out at this late stage? Are they putting their house back on the market? I hate chains :( there’s no communication about anything that’s not directly either side of your own purchase/ sale! Information trickles through so slowly.

Sorry only just seen your comment. They’re back in.. for now ! But they don’t want to complete before the end of jan which is ok with us as we will save £2500 on our current mortgage by waiting till jan 30th. Fingers crossed it goes well from here !

Aren't the estate agents meant to do due diligence on the buyers and the chain? Make sure it's all
Kosher?

Hi all,
Can I join this thread?
We put our house on the market in November 2019. Accepted an offer first week in Jan days before having baby no. 2.
A year later we have still not moved. We are on our fourth buyer 🙄 and our second purchase property.

Current buyer has been waiting around 8 weeks for mortgage to be approved (Santander). Anyone else experienced such long wait times for mortgage approval?

Our EA assures us they did due diligence and checked finances but am getting worried.

I wanted to be in by now as we are relocating and need to apply for school for DD in Jan.

Am losing the will.... 😱

I’m in the middle of a chain of 6 and just found out today it is likely to collapse. We have been waiting since August for the mortgage offer for the first time buyers at the bottom of the chain to come through, 4 months and it’s still not though, wtf are these mortgage companies doing?? We now have fewer than 5 working days to exchange as the people at the top of the chain are moving to France and have to register residency before Brexit. I am also recently divorced (hence the sale of the family home). I really cannot take much more of this stress. We were all aiming for end of November completion and it has dragged on and on and on. I am surrounded by boxes and I cannot face the thought of picking myself up after Christmas and trying to find another house...

@FVFrog

I’m in the middle of a chain of 6 and just found out today it is likely to collapse. We have been waiting since August for the mortgage offer for the first time buyers at the bottom of the chain to come through, 4 months and it’s still not though, wtf are these mortgage companies doing?? We now have fewer than 5 working days to exchange as the people at the top of the chain are moving to France and have to register residency before Brexit. I am also recently divorced (hence the sale of the family home). I really cannot take much more of this stress. We were all aiming for end of November completion and it has dragged on and on and on. I am surrounded by boxes and I cannot face the thought of picking myself up after Christmas and trying to find another house...

Oh bloody hell, I really feel for you . Your situation sounds similar to mine as in ftb at the bottom and the hold up was with their solicitor. We then had our vendor pull out on us . Was so stressful but it’s on the way to being sorted now hopefully. Hope you can say the same soon !

Jeez 4 months!!! This does not bode well.

It's just so stressful, isn't it!

I don't know how the banks are able to get away with it. I wonder how many staff they have furloughed.

Sounds like you all have some very stressful situations. We applied for our mortgage at end of August and it took until the middle of November to get the offer! I think the banks are very slow at the moment! Ours was a little more complicated than a standard mortgage as we own our own business though.

Trying to recalibrate and start to think about starting the search for a new house to buy. The delays with the mortgage companies are ridiculous!

We were due to exchange tomorrow and complete on Thursday. Had a call this morning saying our buyers solicitors had lost their signed contracts. It was posted in and signed for on delivery but is nowhere to be seen since. Buyers quickly printed off another contract, signed it and it will be with solicitors tomorrow morning. Now though their buyers are saying they have to complete on thursday as they are going out of the country on Friday...seriously!!!!

We’re really hoping they agree to complete from abroad as completion on Thursday is now just not an option and remain in rented until they return...but won’t know until tomorrow

In the meantime my kids are asking for all the toys we have packed and I’ve given up on saying no cos I have no idea when we will leave so I’m going through boxes looking for all the things they want

M2906 - it sounds like your buyers have the same solicitor as we had. She was completely incompetent and ended up losing us a buyer.

It sounds super stressful for you. I hope it goes through ok.

We put a box of toys in storage in a friend's garage when we first started viewings and over a year later, we still haven't moved and our children are in danger of out growing the toys. I should go and get them really, as they will be like new toys for them now, which could help with lockdown.

It looks like our buyers aren't going to get their mortgage. This is our fourth buyer that is about to fall through. We are now having to rethink our plans. It's so frustrating!

We are three in a property chain of four.
We accepted an offer early September 2024 buyer at bottom of chain,had a bridging loan in place,12 weeks on imminent exchange,so elated,75% packed and ready.Some pieces of furniture quickly sold off at silly prices, ready for the last push to completion. Then the chain is informed, that the buyer at the bottom is only now applying for a standard mortgage! No one wanted to break the chain after 12 weeks, an application for a mortgage shouldn’t take too long. The only news we received in that additional 12 weeks, were reports that things were still with the underwriters and numerous times told that we would hear news in a few days , which never materialised. Now even our solicitors, conveyancers and estate agents had lost interest in feeding the chain with updates that offered no further information. We are 6 months in, the stress and worry, hopes of a ever fulfilling our dreams are tarnished with time, poor communication and false promises.
February 8th
Friday we are informed by our buyer , (she is the only one communicating with bottom of chain) It transpires that the mother of BOC. has sold her property and gifting a (sum of money?) to BOC with the intention of moving in with them, this raises a host of questions, however it’s a lifeline .
so once again we begin a third chapter of this fiasco , all hoping this moves swiftly to completion, bearing in mind we all want this to complete before March 31st when we would all incur an additional £2500 in Stamp Duty, which would be
A final slap in the face after showing such resilience .

Why do you feel sorry for the agent? Their ONE JOB is to ascertain who's proceedable, why and how (cash, rented, mortgage etc) AND see evidence.

Why wasn't that done?