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.

thank you everyone who sent good luck wishes our way @dubyalass @FuzzyPuffling @nellyelloe and everyone else

@SquashSqueezee fantastic news on the exchange

well we are in!!!’ I cannot tell you what a relief it is. 7 months after we decided to sell our house, 1st buyer pulled out, having to offer above market price, getting downvalued on the mortgage, stress with the whole title deeds situation.

we completed around 11.30 on our sale and handed keys over then we had a tense wait for our keys as all our belongings were packed up in 2 vans. Finally got keys around 4.30pm so we were up late getting everything in.

Today we’ve spent most of the day unpacking. The bathrooms, boys bedrooms, our room, lounge and kitchen is all now unpacked. The only room left to do is the spare bedroom/office which is a bit of a dumping ground.

i absolutely love it and I haven’t once missed rhe old house even after 20 years there.

Definitely worth waiting for.

wishing those of you still waiting smooth journeys with your moves

Fantastic news @RM2013 ! Am so pleased for you. Worth the wait indeed - I'm lying in bed in my new place, boxes and bags everywhere, stuff in disarray, possible mouse problem, but it's all mine, even the mouse droppings 🐭 Lots to do to make it how I want it, but I can wait.

Fantastic news @RM2013 and so great to hear you love the new place! That sounds like a nervy wait for the keys.

In full packing mode here, still massively anxious even though we’ve exchanged. Packers and removals are confirmed now which is a relief so one way or another our stuff will all be out of here on time.

hopefully my next update I’ll be sending from the new place.

rooting for everyone still waiting to exchange.

Hello.

only just found this thread. We put our house on the market end of October and sold within 2 weeks. We’re moving in 3 weeks. Only 3 in chain so has all been pretty straight forward luckily. Our buyers have apparently signed contract and paid their deposit.

However they want to come in on Saturday to look at the house? What does that mean? My husband is flapping and worried they’re trying to find something to knock the price down? I said it’s probably because they want to measure for furniture or something? Is this normal?

Thanks

Great news, you’re in your new houses. Got the keys myself on Monday, the entire house looks like a war zone now. We’re preparing it for the electrician and the gas engineer as we’re changing everything. Wallpaper stripping is a nightmare. Still leaving in my rental place, which feels like my home. When up at the new house and doing the work can’t wait to get back to my place, which isn’t mine but feels like home. Odd feeling.
@Sweetpea84 it’s normal, do not worry. We asked for a second viewing as well to take more measurements. I suppose they would like to take advantage of the January sales.

We're still waiting!! Despite needing to complete before Christmas for mortgage reasons, we're still waiting! We've asked for 27/1 but the buyer's solicitors want 31st....
It's soul destroying...

Just checking in to see how everyone is doing.
@Blueuggboots hang in there. It is soul destroying and we only got positive movement when I threatened to pull out.

@Sweetpea84 how did the second viewing go? Probably just for measurements but I would have panicked too!!

so we got our keys and moved in Weds. Have driven past our old house a couple of times S it’s just around the corner from my parents’ house. Was strange seeing other vehicles parked on the drive but didn’t feel sad at all.

we have worked so hard these last few days and we are completely unpacked now apart from the spare bedroom which will be turned into an office.

The house is perfect and Im so glad we made the move.

Hope it gives some hope that things will happen. Was a long 6 months of stress but so happy now

Ok, I'll keep my hopes up. Maybe we're not that far off.

Week 46 begins..! I'm hoping that the Year of the Rabbit has a bit more luck in store for everyone

Congratulations @dubyalass, @RM2013 and @MissTangerine!

We’re due to exchange and complete tomorrow, our mortgage has even been drawn down ready! We’re doing both in one day because someone (my partner) forgot to sort our specialist renovation insurance and someone (the estate agent) forgot to send our seller’s solicitor the updated memorandum of sale when we adjusted the price in December leading to two failed attempts to exchange 🙃

No excitement yet because I’m very sceptical. It’s been 41 weeks since our offer was accepted and we originally listed our now sold flat in June 2021, I’ll believe it’s real when I’ve got the keys in my hands!!

I think that's the best approach @rrrrrreatt - I did the same and it helped to reduce my stress levels somewhat. I thought mine was bad at nearly 30 weeks! Good luck for tomorrow, my fingers are crossed for you.

Forgot to come back on here and update! We completed on Friday!!!
I'm camping out in the house for the next week or so until my furniture arrives!

But it's fab!!!

Congratulations!

@justgettingthroughtheday congratulations 🥳

I'm mightily fed up and would appreciate advice. If you've been following my story, we're in a chain of 4. We are top of the chain. Everyone has been ready to exchange since December, with the exception of our buyer's mortgage offer. They had the valuation survey done 4th November, and if we believe what we've been told, the bank (Natwest) still hadn't given him his offer. Finally last week on Thursday , we were told Natwest had asked for one more bit of evidence from them (which they'd sent) and then the offer was imminent, as in, a few days.
I got a call from the estate agent this afternoon, thinking 'wow, his offer is finally in'. But what I was actually told was, 'your buyer has now applied for a different mortgage and they need another valuation survey'. The reasoning being that apparently a different mortgage provider would be quicker than Natwest (who was apparently imminently giving them the mortgage offer🤔). The estate agent has spoken to his mortgage broker who has said the new mortgage provider should get the offer out very quickly....but we've heard that before...

We are being taken for a ride aren't we? How can a different mortgage be quicker than the one they applied for and had a valuation survey done in November? It's almost February.

We've said that if he isn't in a position to exchange by 3rd Feb (next Friday) then we are putting our house back on the market.

I hate being lied to and being told half truths. What would you all do in this situation?

Do you think they're struggling to get a mortgage @nellyelloe?

Yes I do, and they've not been honest about it. This should have been sorted out at the start of the process and instead, 3 other families are in limbo. I'm sick of it

Has anyone asked this outright?

Yes, but they deny it and say an offer is imminent. This has gone on since 4th November. And then today we hear they are applying for a different mortgage as 'it will be quicker'. I just don't understand it

Hmm, it does sound fishy

I’ve been silently following along for a while but now needing some advice from those more experienced than me!
We’re currently in a new build shared ownership so semi home owners but that purchase was straight forward as it was just us. Now we’re selling and buying which is a completely new process for us. Offer accepted back in October and thought it was all going relatively well. At the viewing the family said they were moving into a care home (elderly couple with dementia. Daughter acting on their behalf as LPA) so we assumed end of chain. We’ve just found out today that there’s a hold up on their purchase as they’ve decided to do a last minute survey. Is that completely naive on our part for not asking how many were in the chain or should this have come up by this point?? Feeling super frustrated with it all now as we’ve been told that the sale and purchase for us were basically there so I thought we’d be in a position to exchange really soon. Now feels like a huge step backwards and I’m not really sure how to express this to the solicitor! What would you guys do?

It doesn't sound that different from our purchase last year @tryingtryinggone
We were buying from elderly widower who was chain-free because he was moving into a retirement flat and already had a place sorted. We did actually ask and the EA assured us it was chain-free, but sadly we didn't get this in writing.

Our solicitor eventually found out from them that probate hadn't been granted on the retirement flat so everything had to wait for that. Which added 6-8 weeks. TBH though the seller was really not prepared for the reality of moving and produced other delays too.

So, you maybe made the same mistake we did of not clarifying exactly what they meant. But why would you, as it sounds so simple?! It also sounds like they're not moving into a care home - you don't get a survey done for that?

You could query with the EA why you were told that when it isn't the case. We did that and they flat out denied they'd said it was chain-free. And, of course, we had no evidence...

Are they moving into a retirement flat rather than a care home?

We completed today, one of most stressful days of my life!

Congratulations!

We completed and got our keys on Tuesday evening!! The house needs even more work than we knew about, a windowsill is falling away from the wall in our dining room - something that even the surveyor didn’t spot because a sofa was up against the wall until now. The electrician starts next week and we’ve got builders coming round on Monday to finalise their quotes!

@tryingtryinggone your situation sounds similar to ours. Our seller was buying a supported flat and we were delayed by 5 months as the person selling the flat didn’t have the right kind of LPA (only had health not finances). Be really firm and clear about your expectations for resolution and any hard deadlines. Our mortgage was due to expire and we couldn’t extend so that was our hard line! No one wanted to give a timeline so we chased every week for months, even turning up in person sometimes!

Congratulations on completing @rrrrrreatt!

It seems to be getting worse 😬 @rrrrrreatt @RidingMyBike we’ve been told today by our EA who spoke to the sellers EA that there could potentially be an above chain with 2 extra houses being added. At this point!! I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. I’ve sent bit of a snotty email to our solicitor for an update asap as we’re not getting told anything by them really and said we need to discuss dates but this added news changes it all a bit. I’m 6ish months pregnant so can’t be adding 3 months to this process. But even if we pull out and look for something else there would be that amount of time anyway so feeling really stuck now