Buyers Sellers Roll Call 14

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New thread for anyone buying or selling houses at the moment - come join us!

The previous thread ran for about 10 weeks and in ordinary (non-stamp duty holiday) times, that's long enough to get a transaction through, so let's hope this thread sees lots of people finish!

Fingers crossed for you @hassletassle and @cathybates!

We've already heard our exchange isn't happening today. I didn't realise they are still awaiting our vendor signing something! Apparently it didn't come in the post on Saturday but it 'should' today and then she will return it by hand and hopefully exchange tomorrow or Thurs.

They never seem to have any urgency! If she's capable of hand-delivering to the solicitor, then why not pick up by hand (there are safe ways to do it). What if she doesn't like whatever it is she's been sent to sign or has more questions (I'm not sure what it is, they didn't say it was contracts - we did ours ages ago)? Feels like it's slipping away already and we have removers tentatively booked in for the 15th.

Waiting to hear whether our offer has been accepted. We were the first to view on Thursday and offered that afternoon, asking price. They then had more viewings on Saturday so we knew no decision would be made before then, which is fair enough.

EA rang yesterday afternoon to say vendors were 'considering our offer' but obviously still waiting to see if anything came in after the weekend. I just wish they'd let us know one way or another though!

But, am stupidly now worrying we've offered on a dud property - the market is very hot where we are looking and all the good stuff seem to go to best and finals or gets snapped up before it even hits the market. The house is in a fab location but is a modern house on a street of period ones, plus it's been rented out for years so is rather scruffy and obviously needs work once you get in there (the RM pictures are deceptively smart) - I'm hoping that's why it's not been inundated with offers!

Still nothing. I deliberately sent my solicitor a long email yesterday (we weee supposed to exchange last Thursday). No response. Chased her at 1130. No response. What the fuck are they playing at?!

This whole process really fucks me off.

@cathybates me too. We were supposed to be moving in January, it was one issue after another with people in our chain, finally all got resolved a couple of weeks ago and still no exchange. I've had no communication from the solicitor despite sending an email on Thursday and another one this morning, I've now phoned and left a message. I know they're busy but I don't know why they think it's acceptable to not respond at all.

@hassletassle so sorry yours has been shit for so long. I totally agree with you - it’s not acceptable. I’m a lawyer and if I didn’t respond like this I’d get sacked! Property lawyers appear to be a different breed.....

Hi all. I've been following this thread for some time but thought i'd jump on to share my position- we accepted an offer and had an offer accepted on our purchase in February. We are the middle property of a three house (4 party) chain. Our buyers are first time buyers and insisting on completion prior to the SDLT deadline. The chain is all on board with this and everyone is apparently working towards this but i just can't believe it will happen in the current climate.

Our buyers are FTB and being extremely hard work in terms of asking very detailed questions about the property and local area, knocking on numerous neighbours' doors to discuss the street and have visited three times now (twice in 10 days on one occasion). I am convinced that something will come up that will make them pull out so very much struggling to believe we will be moving any time soon. I am almost 7 months pregnant which is proving difficult as my raging hormones are making a stressful time even more difficult. Does anyone else live in fear of a call/email from the EA or solicitor to tell them bad news?

Does anyone else live in fear of a call/email from the EA or solicitor to tell them bad news?

🙋‍♀️ me!

@BlueCherryBlossom Oh good! Misery loves company and all that!

Thanks everybody. I have viewed a couple of new properties now. Both contenders but not as good as the one I lost. There's nothing equivalent to it on the market, it was a bit of a find. So question is, do I hold out for another perfect house or do I just settle with something else? I've seen a couple of chain free places so I still have hope of meeting the stamp duty deadline but its a bit of a long shot.

@LBee2020 our buyers are nervy FTB too, it is a worry but they've forked out a fair bit on surveys and searches etc so I try and reassure myself that they are fairly invested in completing. It's the sheer uncertainty and lack of control that making the whole process such a nightmare I think, I'm beginning to question whether I might in fact be a raging control freak at heart 🤔😂

@10YellowTulips it would be a shame to settle and then not make the stamp duty deadline anyway. Personally I'm not sure I'd want to compromise too much for the sake of the stamp duty saving: it's a lot of money of course but not really in the context of the total you are spending. Tough situation to be in

Doesn’t look like exchange will happen today now as buyers solicitor delaying again and mines gone home!

@cathybates i need a job where i can go home at 3pm with urgent things still outstanding!

@LBee2020 me too!

So obviously, as expected, it’s not bloody happened today. So am hoping it will be tomorrow and then completion will be 14th.

The whole process is just horrendous from start to finish and I feel like most of my maternity leave has been spent dealing with it and being stressed out by it

We are getting closer with our sale! Buyers have chivvied us along via the EA, saying they are keen to exchange ASAP, which is HUGELY reassuring!

Sadly we can't move any faster, just awaiting a duplicate cert they want, from a third party company (considering indemnity policy in the meantime- has anyone got any experience of such things?). All other enquiries were answered and documentation provided to our solicitor on Thursday, although I suppose it's possible that hasn't reached the buyers yet (or even their solitictors) due to the Easter weekend.

EA contacted us right at the end of the working day so I'm looking forward to having a solid reason to speak to our solicitors in the morning (who, to be fair, are pretty proactive, so I don't like to hassle for no reason!).

Fingers crossed for tomorrow @cathybates.

After flapping last week over how slow the solicitor has been, realised today that the stamp duty deadline is end of June not beginning, so that’s an extra month of time. Solicitor has forwarded email from LA stating that they’re taking around 5 weeks to process searches, so should have enough time to complete before then. Waiting for an update from EA as to how our seller is getting on with their purchase. Our survey is next week so hopefully that doesn’t throw up anything major.

We’ve exchanged!!! She must’ve been working late or from home today. It’s done!!! Completion on 13th. Hope all goes smoothly for everyone else

@cathybates

We’ve exchanged!!! She must’ve been working late or from home today. It’s done!!! Completion on 13th. Hope all goes smoothly for everyone else

Fabulous!! Congratulations!!!

@cathybates woooohh , congratulations!!

We were meant to be exchanging today and completing/moving tomorrow.

Phoned this morning and our solicitor had heard nothing. They did a bit of digging and. Our cash buyer hasn't transferred funds to their solicitor. Apparently he can only transfer £x amount a day which would take 3 days of transferring money. He's transferred one lot, was trying to transfer 2nd amount today but the bank system has gone down and he hasn't been able to.

So no moving tomorrow 😔

They're now hoping for completion on Friday, they're trying to push it until next week but we've booked time off work this week (as it was arranged a month ago that we'd exchange and complete this week) so would need to arrange further time off but would be unpaid (if we were allowed it off!!!)

Great news! What a relief for you!

I’m still very grumpy, our broker still hasn’t got back to us. 2 weeks!!! We need the mortgage details for one of the forms that we supplied to the solicitors. Our estate agent phoned us saying the vendor was shocked we haven’t had a mortgage valuation done yet. I’m scared she’s going to be put off as we sold ourselves as being incredibly motivated to push through now we don’t look like we are doing anything!

It’s so annoying as we didn’t want to go through with the broker in the first place it was to speed it up 🥲. Fingers crossed tomorrow he will come through. He actually phoned me today pretending he thought my number was DP’s. He blatantly was too scared to phone him as he knew he would get a very unwelcome reception. The very quick phone call said it would be done tomorrow. I have no faith.

Sorry @OneStepInTheFuture I missed your post. How frustrating. It sounds like an excuse too. Not that I’m in any way an expert.
Positive thoughts it will happen for Friday.

@OneStepInTheFuture argh that's so unbelievably rubbish for you , particularly when you need to get time off in advance 😬

I finally got through to my solicitor on the phone this morning, I was amazed when his voice actually came on the line… Anyway, our buyers'-buyers' solicitor has gone quiet so he's being chased by literally everybody now. I've made it clear that I need to know if it's just admin/slowness causing the delay (e.g. exchange is imminent) or alternatively is there an issue that need sorting (e.g. exchange could be weeks away). We literally have no expectation management going on !

exciting update alert
After losing out on our dream house. 2 weeks ago to best and final offers I have had a call saying the buyer has just pulled out and our offer has been accepted!

Our chain is completed. Im so fucking excited!