Expired searches - what to do?

[Delphinee]

Oh dear, we were finally just about to set an exchange date but my solicitor just discovered that searches have just expired! Lender accepts 6 months and we’ve just past this. My solicitor is checking if the lender would accept an indemnity policy, if not I understand we’d need new searches. I’m trying to get an estimate from my solicitor how much time would that take bur somehow they are avoiding answering. Our mortgage offer (2.4%, fixed for 5 yrs!) expires end of November and I'm now really worried and annoyed that because of searches we may loose it.
Does anyone have any experience with such situation?

Arranging search indemnity insurance is fairly doable and most lenders accept it (if you've a mortgage), I managed to find out about our lenders Nat West online just by goggling it. Local searches might take longest to come back, again I believe its possible to check how long the authority involved is taking at the moment, and some solicitors have ways of progressing them a bit quicker. Beware that it's not so much the searches but the subsequent enquiries that take the time, you have to get your vendor, their progressions agent, their solicitor and yours all lined up to facilitate this (e.g. Make sure its all done via emails and everyone is chasing everyone else daily), solicitor might be ready to start raising enquiries now about standard predictable stuff - floods, septic tanks etc. Most lead precisely nowhere but still need to be done. GOOD LUCK

Thank you dholl!
i do hope TSB will accept the policy, it’s just that now the interest rates as significantly higher and I’m worried they would not accept the policy, simply because new rate should ours expired before we can get searches back, would be higher.
We do have all enquiries sorted, responses from sellers received so I think, worst case scenario is that solicitor would have to do searches again. I’m happy to pay for these to be expedited. The whole process is so stressful and it feels like it’s one thing after another.

Your solicitor should very easily know the answer to this. There is a handbook of all the lenders and answers to lots of questions one of which will be around searches. Slightly concerning that they didn't do that and let you know the position but hopefully insurance will be fine and it's easy and quick to sort out.

I’m a property solicitor. Even if lender doesn’t accept search insurance (many do) there is still time to carry out searches before the end of November. Most search providers could get the searches back in 2 - 3 weeks, and your solicitor can also ask for them to be expedited. The new searches should really show up the same matters as the old ones (unless any planning applications etc have been submitted in the last 6 months!) so there shouldn’t be additional enquiries when new search results come back. In short, this is doable for end of November and so don’t panic just yet!

Thank you so much Grumpymummy1234!!