Selling house and renting before buying - how?

[Justkeepswimming321]

Hello, bit of advice requested please.
We are selling our house to relocate. All is going smoothly so far. Got the survey in a couple of weeks. Obviously aiming to complete before end of June SD deadline.

We are intending to into rented accommodation between selling and buying, for a variety of reasons (not least the fact that we haven't seen a house we like yet that hasn't gone to sealed bids - it's crazy right now!!).

There aren't many reasonably priced rental properties available in the area we need (we have 2 kids and will need to commute to different areas for work so location and type of home is narrowed down for us). But one really well priced house that looks absolutely perfect came up today. We are viewing it tomorrow.

We don't mind a little bit of overlap and can cover the cost of a month or two of mortgage plus rent, both ends. However - what if our house sale falls through?! At the moment I can't see any reason why it should, and our buyers are apparently super keen (they are very excited about beating the stamp duty deadline) but what if something goes wrong? We would have to pay for both our mortgage and rent. While we could probably just about afford that for the minimum 6 months or our contract, it would take up almost all of our savings (aside from the money we intend to put into buying our new house, obviously) and is obviously very undesirable.

Should we wait until we exchange until we sign a rental contract? But then what if we get nowhere? There are so very few reasonably priced rental properties in the areas we are looking. I feel really uneasy about having nowhere to live if we wait for exchange and then can't find anywhere to rent at short notice. One option might usually be to delay completion, to allow longer between exchange and completion and therefore time to set up a rental contract, but we can't delay completion because of the stamp duty deadline.

What would you advise? What would you do?
Thanks in advance!

The Lettings agents should be familiar with this scenario and I just sold and renting now. I paid a holding deposit of one week’s rent and negotiated to pay the rest of deposit and first month’s rent at point of exchange. They should be fine with it.

Similar - I think we had 2 weeks between exchange and completion, paid a holding deposit (and referencing I think) a week or two before exchange to get the ball rolling. As the pp says, explain your position to the letting agents, they'll help.

I did this! I was told 2 weeks because I needed references. So I moved out then. We exchanged and completed a month later.

It was extra money but I needed the comfort that we had somewhere to live so I just thought of it as moving costs.

We were lucky as viewed a rental the day after they gave notice before it was fully on the market. So had a delay before committing meaning we only had a months overlap and we moved out as it suited us not to have the stress of doing it all on the same day.

We rented for just over a year, before buying and moving which was brilliant as gave time for the right house to come up.

I am not even looking at rentals until I have exchange dates. It is very hard to find a decent rental, and unless everything goes pear shaped (I am buying somewhere, but the seller hasn't found a house so need one in between my sale and purchase) I hope I won't need the rental for more than a month or two, so I am looking at Airbnb. It is not too much more than a long term rent where I'm at, and can be negotiable if using it longer term, though there is a limit to how long. Plus there seems to be much more availability. (And why do people always hate landlords when you can see they do provide a much needed service!)

Thank you! I had no idea estate agents might accept a holding deposit and then the rest at exchange - fantastic idea!!

We did look airbnb but it's about 3x the price... Plus with two little kids it's more upheavel for them. If it was just me and my husband it would be easy.

Thanks again for the useful tips!!

How close are your buyers to exchanging? We waited till they were ready for exchange, then put a holding deposit down with 2 weeks till completion. I would caveat with don’t rent somewhere “too” nice as it demotivated us as buyers into sticking to the list, however with lockdown I’m glad we decided to go with a bigger place. We managed only to have 1 week at the front end overlapping. In the middle of a purchase so don’t know how long the overlap will be at the other end.

Thanks. Exchange unlikely until late May / early June so there won't be long between exchange and completion. We found a nice little rental place yesterday for a good price... Really worried if we don't take it now there won't be anything else as suitable on the market in our tiny timeframe in June 😬 The holding deposit idea is a really good one - will ask about it. Good point re not 'too' nice... But while it is a little nicer than the place we are currently renting (in some ways - worse in others) it's not a patch on the type of home we hope to buy so we will be keen to buy!

I did this a few years ago. I won’t lie, it was a bit stressful and unsettling being so close to exchange without knowing where I was going to be living, but it all came good in the end. My top tip would be to lean heavily on the agent selling your home to help you secure a rental (assuming they have a lettings team and cover the right area - sorry if I’ve missed that). As you’re top of the chain and the whole thing hinges on you, there should be extra incentive for your agent to help you find somewhere. In my case, my agent “put in a good word” for me with a colleague in lettings to help me secure the rental I wanted - I don’t think I’d have got it otherwise as it was very popular.

Hope it all goes smoothly for you. Being chain free certainly made buying my next place so much easier and less stressful.

Many thanks! We're actually relocating so the EA wouldn't be able to assist with that, and that's what makes it all the more stressful in terms of having nowhere to live... I wouldn't mind if it was just my husband and I (especially in non Covid times) as we'd figure something out (we've rented a room in an Airbnb for as few weeks before while waiting for our previous property) but I cant risk as much now we have the kids in tow! The chain is thankfully only two houses - our buyers' flat is being bought by first time buyers - so SHOULD be okay but you just never know! I think we might have to just do it and keep our fingers crossed... if exchange is delayed for whatever reason we will have no chance of getting a rental place in time for completion anyway as I remember it can take a couple of weeks to get the legal stuff (contracts, references, money etc) sorted out!