What happens if I can't empty house by completion day?

[competion]

What happens if there are still things in the house when the new owner arrives? Going as fast as I can but unlikely to be done by tomorrow...

there is no time scale, it’s as long as it takes. Our last house move we were going from rented, so bottom of the chain, and it was 3pm before we got the keys. Our second house purchase we were middle of a 3 party chain. We were called at midday to say we had completed on the sale, and therefore no longer owned our house. It took another 50 minutes before we were called to say we could collect our keys for the new place and were owners of that one. We stayed in the old house for that 50 mins but everything was out and we were just making sure everything was clean etc. so we were in the new place by 1.15pm ish.
she may have all day tomorrow, she may not much time at all.

It can depend, either 12pm or 4pm are usually the preset times.

We’ve had before an email at a random time saying we completed but usually we were never in a rush to move on the day thank goodness.

That soUnds like a logistical nightmare 😩

SOFT PLAY?????
they have to move a whole house and they have decided that they have time to… SOFT PLAY?!?

Most people get themselves together. I wouldn’t go to the expense of storage and getting the removal team to get it all from storage to new house on the off chance that you have foolishly decided to buy from the OP’s sister!

Given her partner must know she’s not great at organising stuff, why hasn’t he/she pitched in and sorted this, or is he/she also afflicted? If I knew my DH was like this, I’d make double sure I was as organised as possible.

Not wanting to cope with situations doesn't mean others should handle them for you.

We have sent links to removals. To people that collect unwanted furniture. We advised them to exchange earlier than a week before completion to give more time. We said several times get prepared.

I've got my own very busy life to sort out, I'm not sorting hers out (again) for her.

Like her HUSBAND you mean, who also lives in the house, he could have sorted it easily but has decided for whatever reason not to. I wouldn’t be stepping in to help either.

We exchanged at 6 pm and only because everyone including our estate agent and theirs pitched in to help them get everything out. We'd been told 3 o clock but as they weren't ready the estate agent said he'd meet us there at 5.
Everyone helped out including us, it was a little frustrating but understandable.

That’s the worst case scenario for the OP, but what about the poor sods moving in? Their worst case scenario is already happening….they’ve waited months for their new house, they’ve packed up everything in a timely manner, got a removal team on the clock and: when they get there they won’t be able to move in. It’s appalling. Disgraceful, in fact.

If that had happened to us when we lived, with a small baby in the depths of a freezing winter late in the day, after a stressful process, I would not have just been completely livid, I probably would have broken down on the doorstep and cried my heart out.

OP - you do not stop throughout the night until everything is packed so that you are out tomorrow. The house will no longer be yours, you and your stuff cannot be there.

How annoying for the buyers. You should have got your act together. Offer to pay the, for the inconvenience.

Why should OP have got her act together?

Also, if it was the OP (which it isn’t), it’s not a matter of ‘offering to pay’, if the seller isn’t out, they are liable for damages.

No. There is something you can legally do. You can chuck him out of YOUR property and hire a moving company, invoiced to him as per the contract, to do the work. Can’t believe people do this.

Keep what? All the belongings of an entire house? I've got my own house full of stuff that I like and I paid for. Why would I want someone else's house contents too? Or any part thereof.

Houses dont really come cheap, most people pay a lot of bloody money to own a house, they mostly would like on the day of purchase an empty house to put their own stuff in.

Radical thought I know.

And the dog!

Absolutely fair. But what will you do or say if, or rather when, she sends a plea for help???

We complete on our new house tomorrow and I was about to say ‘if you are our sellers, you have been such arses the last few weeks that it will all go to the tip!’ Then I saw there is a dog. So not them 😂But I am dreading them doing the same tomorrow because of how difficult they have been

Someone tried to do this to me once - luckily in advance. The property was a rental flat and my solicitor called me a week or so before exchange to confirm I was keeping all the furniture.

It was the first I’d heard of it.

It was all typical ‘furnished rental’ (hard wearing but not very nice) plus I had an entire similar sized flat full of furniture that needed space.

He did get rid of it but who just assumes someone wants an entire flat of cheap furniture? He got a bit difficult too and at one point threatened to rip up all the carpets ‘since I didn’t want anything left’.

In retrospect, I should have let him - much easier to replace carpets without furniture - but I didn’t have the money right after completion.

OP - you do not stop throughout the night until everything is packed so that you are out tomorrow. The house will no longer be yours, you and your stuff cannot be there.

@TheAlchemistElixa but the house has never been hers and it's not her stuff!

In fairness, with that kind of sale the buyer is often moving from rented and happy to take the furniture and replace at their leisure. Works well for everyone. Definitely need to check though!

Most rentals are unfurnished (round here, anyway). You don't need somebody else's furniture when you move.

It wasn’t hers to start with since it’s her sister who is moving

Ah ok, furnished is very much the norm here. When we bought our house our apartment was in negative equity so we rented it out for a few years. When we came to sell it was bought by the tenant from across the hall who was very happy to take the furniture and we were very happy to leave it. It worked very well and isn't unusual in that part of the market here.

When I moved into the first property I bought, a flat, the sellers had not removed everything. The garages of the flats were separate from the flats so they put it all into my garage and fastened the garage with a padlock. A couple of days later they must have taken it and removed the padlock. I was quite cross about this. Luckily for them they had their mail redirected because given the circumstances I am not sure I would have redirected it.

The OP isn’t the tenant RTFT.