We're in the process of selling our current house and purchasing another one (the sellers are also buying a property, so chain of 3 houses/4 parties in total).
Process started about 6 weeks ago and so far going smoothly - searches back and enquiries raised for all of them, now going through that long bit.
My question is what to expect in terms of timelines/process, do you generally get a fair amount of notice with regards to exchange & completion dates? I get that those are agreed between parties, but if everyone else is ready to go at a week's notice and want a small gap between exchange and completion, we'd probably be under pressure to do the same! So do the solicitors or EA let you know when you're getting close to the point of discussing dates? Or is it a case of "all parties are ready, full steam ahead"?
I guess I mostly want to know if I should start packing some stuff over the next few weeks just in case things go unusually fast - well aware that for some people it takes several months, it was the case for us when buying this place and there was no chain!