How long has your house purchase taken [so far]??

[dubyalass]

I had an offer accepted in mid-June; no chain. I've had my mortgage offer through and the survey done. There is an issue with ownership of an outbuilding so the vendors are sorting that out with the Land Registry. Searches not done yet but unlikely to be anything tricky there.

I'm hoping that I might be in by the end of October but realistically who knows. I've no idea how long the LR are taking to process casework at the moment. Once that's sorted it should all be pretty quick.

A little bit of (dare I say it) positive movement here today.

firstly the Solicitors dealing with the sale have finally received our signed contract and transfer form. Massively delayed in the postal strike but saved us having to resend copies. So as far as I can tell we are ready for exchange on the sale.

solicitors dealing with purchase have advised that they’ve been in touch with previous owner who has now signed and posted (last weds) the transfer form for the garage. They’re just waiting for it to arrive and for the previous lenders to confirm that their title charge has been removed from the garage. Still no date but some positive progress. Keep everything crossed the form arrives safely

Our solicitor somehow "lost" £102k of our deposit/fees this week.

We remortgaged on our current house on Thursday (let to buy situation); the remortgage solicitor (came free with the new mortgage) transferred the funds through to our purchase solicitor on the same day, via CHAPS. Contacted our purchase solicitor 3 times since Thursday; until 11.30AM this morning they claimed they hadn't received the funds.

Spoke with the remortgage solicitors before lunchtime; they investigated and they spoke with the accounts dept of our purchase solicitors. Turns out the funds (£102k) had in fact arrived on Thursday last week but they hadn't "realised". How you miss over £100k is beyond me. We need those funds for our completion for purchase on Wednesday - thank god we'd factored in a few days buffer! Our purchase solicitor then sent a snarky email saying he'd just emailed us confirmation that they had the funds. No apology or anything.

Am absolutely fuming with purchase solicitors. It's a local firm with a good name which is why we went with them, but they've been absolutely awful. We're putting in a complaint once this purchase has completed.

@RM2013 our buyers didn't attend their solicitors to sign the contract until late this afternoon (we signed ours weeks ago and just had to authorise exchange over the phone). Our buyers solicitors have been slow and rude the whole way through. Our solicitor seems confident it will happen tomorrow.

All fingers and toes crossed @RM2013 and @annonymousse ! And here's some 🍷and 🍫 just in case.

@ISeeTheLight bloody hell I think I would have had a coronary if that had happened to me. How dare they send a snarky email but thank goodness they've located the money. I need to get my deposit cash together so it's ready to go to the solicitors. Just got to remember my passwords... 😬

@ISeeTheLight oh I would be fuming. How can they be so blase about that amount of money?!

@dubyalass thanks for 🍷 and 🍫 all donations gratefully received right now!!! Hope you’re doing ok?

Oh and @dubyalass you’re never going to believe this but with the help of my Dad I actually fixed my dishwasher so no panic about having to tell my buyers that we are no longer leaving it!!

Hurrah, well done!

I am managing my stress with wine and chocolate (in small amounts). And thinking of a fortnight off over Christmas.

Any news guys ? X

Exchange still not happened. We are waiting for our buyers' lenders to release the funds. I'm climbing the walls.

Do you know what the hold up is ?

I said I didn't want the indemnity policies but apparently because they relate to the title, my lender requires them. So that's another £450 I wasn't expecting to pay 🙄 I suppose it's not much in the grand scheme of things and at least I'm benefiting from the stamp duty reduction.

The vendors' solicitors have responded to some other enquiries but I'm out of the office in an area with no reception tomorrow so it's unlikely I'll find out more until Thursday. My hopes of exchanging next Friday are waning...

No news here today so assume that the transfer form didn’t arrive in the post.

I will wait until tomorrow then chase up to see if it’s been received.

EA called to say form signed and posted back but we already knew this from solicitor. Our vendor saying that if not completed by 16th then wants to wait until after Christmas which I do understand. Can’t see we will manage to get exchange and completion done before then.

so am going to push for exchange before Christmas and complete 1st week in Jan

@pavillion1 our buyers' lenders need to confirm they are going to release the funds in time for the planned completion on the 12th dec. as with everything else with these buyers they seem to move slowly. 😣

Do you know who their lenders are? Ours are TSB and they've stalled our completion for tomorrow by not releasing the funds the day before as they ordinarily do and instead saying they will release them tomorrow but can't guarantee what time! If it's late in the day that means we won't be able to complete tomorrow. 😭

Can I join? Cash buyer on a property. Offered late October and waiting... waiting... to exchange. Won't complete until mid January as very old inhabitants need time to pack etc. Patience isn't my forte. Also trying to shift my own place but market is deathly still.

I can't sleep 😵‍💫

@handbagsandholidays I think it's Barclays. They decided 20 weeks into the process to change mortgage supplier and had to have another survey. They've been a bit of a nightmare all the way through.

We're meant to be completing today. Heard nothing from our rubbish solicitors so far. Did get a message from Halifax this morning saying direct debit for mortgage has been set up, so I'm assuming they've released the funds. God this is so stressful!

Our exchange is looking extremely unlikely today and now the solicitor informs us if we still want the planned completion date there will be an extra £174 fee per transaction to expedite matters. I'm starting to wonder if we will be moved in by Christmas 😣

The extra fees only apply if we don't exchange today otherwise to avoid the extra cost we will need to move completion. It has such a knock on effect. Our removals are booked, we've ordered new carpets. Christmas is getting very close. We thought we were going to have time to settle in and be able to enjoy Xmas in our new home. My head feels like it's going to explode.

@annonymousse how stressful I hope you hear some positive news soon

@ISeeTheLight fingers crossed for completion hope all goes well

@dubyalass hows things with you?

Heard nothing since Monday so going to chase for an update today as really want to know if the transfer form from the previous owner has now been received. Genuinely don’t think completion will be before Christmas now which is disappointing but not surprising

We completed! Eventually got the keys by going to the house (vendor was finishing up) around 2.30pm but we are in!

Good luck to everyone else. I'm never doing this again, ever 😅

Ahhhh what a pain!!! Hopefully they will pull their finger out and get it sorted. We managed to complete and now just heading to collect the keys before the EA closes at 4pm 😅

Congrats to @ISeeTheLight for also completing today!! X