Searches/Queries

[trying29]

I appreciate this might be a 'how long is a piece of string' type question. but we had an offer accepted at the end of January on a house. We are chain free as is our seller. We have now been waiting over 5 weeks for the last two searches to come back - is this normal or should we be worried? We have everything in place from our end. We have asked the estate agent to chase the seller's solicitors for us. Is this normal? I am a first time buyer but my partner who I am buyign with is not

I think this is relatively normal. We moved pretty quickly I think and all very straightforward and our searches took about 6-7 weeks.

Typically, the search that takes the longest is the local authority one. Most of the others (water, drainage etc) are available online and come back almost straightaway.

How long a local search takes varies from one local authority to another. Some might be 4 days, others might be 3 months.

At the risk of being pedantic, you don't have everything in place from your end because there are two searches outstanding. Once they're back your solicitor may decide there are further queries to raise.

There is nothing the vendor's solicitor can do to hurry up the searches that your solicitor has asked for.

understood thank you for clarifying. I think i have got confused - our solicitors have said they are waiting for responses to their queries. But if this time frame is normal, that is all I wanted to check! Hearing recent stories of people;s chains collapsing makes me nervous

Ah, got you!

It's not an abnormal timeframe, depends when the questions [queries] were raised and what they were. Some might only need a quick one-line response, others may require a far more detailed and lengthy reply accompanied by other documentation.