Hi all, long time lurker, first time poster - because I am at my wits end! I am looking for thoughts and advice.
Our offer was accepted on 19 October, we are FTB. Our vendors’ offer was accepted the week after. Their vendor is moving country, so we are a two property chain. The EA advised we were looking at 12 weeks or completion.
Our vendor has been very cooperative allowing access for valuation, survey etc and for professionals who we have engaged to do an extension to the kitchen once we move in. However, we are now 14 weeks in and there is no sign of exchange. Information is limited from their side to say the least. I chase one per day for updates to my solicitor and the EA, I probably get a reply once every third day. In fact, we have not had any concrete update as to where matters stand in their onward purchase since well before Christmas. I need to move for work reasons, and I am under severe pressure to move by end of Jan - this has been communicated to them several times via my solicitor and the EA. Their solicitor is not responsive, we maybe get one reply for every 3 chasers we send, and information is not forthcoming when we do get a response. We are 100% ready to exchange.
One week ago today, we were told that they had received the last of their enquiries and wanted to discuss dates, they wanted to complete mid Feb. I explained again, that I needed to move by end of Jan but if I had exchanged I might be able to discuss with work and asked could we meet in the middle and complete 5 Feb. We heard nothing back. On Thursday, I followed up with the EA, he said that the vendors were waiting for contracts to come back signed by the vendors on their onward sale (as in, not my vendors). On Friday I followed up again asking if our dates were acceptable, and the EA responded to tell me that the vendor had told him to “not” contact them until Exchange. Is that not really odd?
Yesterday I spoke to my solicitor, she said she had a curt update from vendors solicitor that my vendor had not yet signed their contracts (even though we had been told weeks ago that they had returned all contracts). My solicitor agreed that this was not normal. She said she was going to follow up again and impress that we needed some comfort as to what was going on. Again, she heard nothing back.
I am extremely worried at this point. It appears that it is our vendors who are delaying. We like this house and will be out of pocket if it doesn’t happen but at this point, I’m close to pulling the plug, cutting my losses and moving into rented to find somewhere else to buy. We have now been homeless for several months (staying with family) and have completely put our lives on hold. I am beginning to form the view that the vendor is not serious about selling or is having second thoughts. Any thoughts and advice would be very much appreciated.