Feeling terrible

[Northernparsley]

Just found a house and had an offer accepted - yay! We accepted an offer on our current property in September and our buyers have been waiting for us to find somewhere. In a meeting with our financial advisor today he said that as we are buying a much cheaper property than originally envisioned (a renovation project instead of the finished article), we could afford to buy the new property, convert our current house to a buy to let and still have enough money to do what we want to the new place. This makes us fully in control of the buying process without unforeseen hold ups and very likely to make the stamp duty deadline. If we don’t make the deadline it will cost us around £20,000 extra. It was a complete curveball but having done all the sums makes complete sense.

Decision is therefore made but I feel like scum. We’ve effectively strung our buyers along and then dumped them now they are of no use.

I feel like the worst person in the world right now - does the guilt subside?

Oooh, @ChateauMargaux, I've been googling 'HMRC approved valuations for tax purposes' and may have come across a company that will do a historic valuation that their website says can be used for capital gains tax. If this is something that HMRC will accept and something that they can do then I am going to be thrilled and grateful to you forever.

OP I saw this thread yesterday and it's been playing on my mind... you say you have made your decision. Have you told the buyers yet? Have you offered to pay any costs they may have incurred up to now?

If you have done either one or both of these things, then that is a hell of a lot better than leaving it any later. From my perspective, as a buyer - we offered full asking price on a home not long ago, which was accepted. We had a change of heart upon second (and third!) viewing, and pulled out of the sale after 3 days. I was acutely aware of the upset I was causing our seller, but that was the right decision for us, and after just 3 days, I knew the damage was minimal.

Not so in your case. When people say "oh, anything can happen, etc. etc. - well no! This is a unique situation, with stamp duty holiday deadline, unbelievably kind and patient buyers - this is not a usual situation in the property buy/sell flux, not at all. It is one of the most brutal, most callous moves I've ever seen in this instance. Despicable. (and no, not even likely to be profitable for you in the long run).

The fact you are even posting about this in an attempt to assuage your guilt almost makes it worse, IMO.