Property purchase driving me crazy - AIBU

[Mazza92]

Property offer accepted in January. Our sellers didn’t find a place till April. They paid for the survey etc but their onward sale fell through. They have now got an offer accepted on a second property a week ago. But their sellers need to find somewhere and no one knows when the chain will complete.

original agreed completion date was July but now with us potentially going into a chain where everyone would have to agree - I just don’t have the patience to carry on waiting! It’s been 7 months already and I think it’s very unfair for us to have to enter another chain because they couldn’t find anywhere - AIBU? Any advice on what to do would be helpful

we have kept on looking but to no avail

This happened to me once . The chain never ever completed

start looking around again. See if there’s anything else out there and be prepared to offer elsewhere

Not everyone can go into rented. It’s really not feasible for anyone porting their mortgage. Especially if it was fixed in Pre-Truss

This was our first purchase situation, it took us 6 months to complete, now we are looking at no chain properties only, couldn’t go through this again. I would pull out if they refused to rent, this could literally go on forever. I hate this process with a passion.

I'd keep looking for something you want.

There's no value in you pulling out unless you have a better deal.

It took 14 months on our current house!

We were renting at the time, but someone higher up the chain kept having houses fall through and the people we were buying off really wanted their house. This place was the only one we could afford for miles around so we waited. Vendors didn’t care, they just told us to pull out if we didn’t want to wait.

We did carry on looking, but like I said, no where else we could afford. Worked out well though, in those 14 months, the values in this area rose significantly.

We are trying to sell it now. There is not a hope I would waste the time and money going into rented accommodation. Renting would be over twice my mortgage payments, we couldn't afford to anyway! Anyone asking me to do that would be told to jog on.

The house buying market is glacial at the moment. There is a shortage of properties on the market where I am, and prices are still dropping in this part of the country. If you pull out you will just be back to step one yourself. Your offer is just that, so just keep looking elsewhere and if you find something else you can pull out (but it might be another chain!). It's just the way it is.

My last move took a year. Our buyer was very patient but if they had pressured us I would have told them to pull out if they wanted to, and I would have found another buyer. So there is not much you can do except be patient.

Pull out

@Wellthisisshitty2 how did you make it work with the 14 months? Didn't your mortgage offer expire? I've also been told searches expire after 6 months, so did you have to have them done more than once? And surveys - at what point did you get that done?

Sorry to bombard with questions, but I could potentially be looking at a similarly long-winded conveyancing process and wondering how on earth you make it work.

I'm guessing you're not selling yourself, and a first time buyer? If so you're a really good buyer, they should be making more of an effort to keep you onside.
If you really, really want this property then wait, but until you exchange you've obviously got no guarantee that these people will actually sell to you in the end.

I agree with @Flossyts, I'd keep looking to see if there is anything else you really like, particularly somewhere with no chain. If you let the estate agent know that this is what you are considering doing he may well put pressure on them to get on with it and consider renting, or maybe even drop the price. It's in the agent's interest to make sure the sale happens, otherwise he won't get paid.
People on here seem to disagree on whether it is a buyer's or a seller's market, either way if you are a first time buyer you have the edge as you have no chain behind you.

It isn't so much the time that chains take to get properly organised as the fact that there is no penalty for pulling out of a deal and pulling the whole chain apart. Many people in the chain will have already paid out fees for mortgages, surveys, searches of various kinds, leasehold packs, solicitors and so on. If someone pulls out they should make a substantial contribution towards these costs.

We were once unable to move into our new house on the day of completion because the sale price transfer for our own house did not reach us in time to make the payment for our new house and move everything in. Because there was obviously a contract in place the person who had made the late payment, two people down the chain from us, had to pay all the additional fees for everybody in the chain: charges for an extra removal day, charges to the mortgage companies, one person asked for hotel costs (though our family of six went to stay with various friends for the night). It was a pretty scary day, and was the reason why I will never agree to complete on a Friday.

Well, that’s why in some European countries there’s something called a preliminary contract for purchase and if you pull out for no good reason, you pay a penalty of up to 10% of the agreed sale price to other party. It’s amazing how many buyers and sellers move heaven and earth to make these deals happen, speaking from experience.

Thank you all for the replies. An update: So apparently our sellers sellers have found a place but we don’t know if the property is chain free. I have been chasing the estate agent who is selling the property we are buying, she doesn’t have a clue if that last property is chain free

When does this end?! And who should I be chasing to get this process moving - i feel like I’m the only one desperate for things to complete!

The EAs are the people who can all talk to each other to find out if the chain is complete or not.

Tell your EA you need to know if the chain is now complete or not because if it isn't, maybe you are better off finding a different house to buy that is chain free.

You and your buyers have been waiting since January for your seller to find a chain free property or commit to going into a rental. My patience with them would be over if they have entered into a contract with a complicated seller.

I would start looking at other properties. This is insane. Your mortgage offer only lasts a certain timeframe as well.