The all new buyers/sellers waiting room (x 7!) thread

[JoyfulSpring]

Starting a new thread so we can continue the conversation...

Ooh, good shout! I was just about to - glad I saw this!

Im eager for this week - survey results hopefully, confirm gift documents, mortgage offer sent to solictor as apparently lender hasnt and then contracts dropped off!

Attending for roll call! Expectimg to exchange this week (unless my buyers solicitor wants to ask me when the boiler was serviced for the fourth time!). We will then have a delay between exchange and completion whilst we wait for our new build to be completed. Joists are in for first floor and they've started on the walls of the second floor. Hopefully the roof will be in by the end of Feb to keep us. In line with an April completion. I expect to still be here into the next thread.

I've got an appointment with the developer to finalise options for kitchen, tiles, flooring etc on 15th.

I was on this thread back in 2020 when Covid lockdown was announced and suddenly everyone had to exchange and complete on the same day. Loads of chaos and fall throughs. It was hell.

Anyway, I’m back baby. With the house on the market 😭 i think selling and buying in Covid has affected my stress response to this stuff.

I am simply not in the mood for it all but we have to move 100 miles away.

The market where we’re selling seems ok ish. The market where we’re buying is dead!
Houses are worth exactly the same.

So it’ll be interesting!

@TheCatCameBack112 We are thinking of buying a new build! How is that going for you? We won’t be able to Part Exchange as our house is worth the same as a new build one in the new location.

How have you found it all? We are marketing the house as per usual with normal estate agents. But the developers have so far been very pushy! We haven’t agreed to a plot yet because their pushiness is putting us off.

@Poldarkknows is it one of the high volume builders? They are very pushy in my experience.

Not sure if I updated on the last thread but we have had an offer accepted on a house. We have just heard that they have found a vacant property so chain is complete. Cue my mind going into overdrive and stressing already! We have been trying to move since 2021..........

@Poldarkknows we decided to try our developer's assisted move scheme, which involved two local agents providing valuations to market (we had final choice of agent and price) and they use an intermediary to manage the communications with agents and solicitors to ensure things run smoothly. The developers pay fees for EA as part of the package. We could have used the part ex but would have been limited in plots to houses that were almost complete which had some concessions around garden size and aspect.

We were fortunate that we had a proceedable offer within 3 weeks of the house going on the market and our buyers are FTB so no long chain to deal with. The developers would have dropped us or put pressure on us to reduce if we didn't get a decent offer in the first six weeks.

We couldn't formally reserve out plot until we had an offer and our buyer was checked out as proceedable. The developers are now very keen to push to exchange as they want to lock in the sale (and release some cash). Technically exchange should be achieved in 6 weeks from offer but we are already on 10 weeks and have hqd the solicitor shutdown over Christmas. Given we have the benefit of the intermediary to manage the chain, FTB who have finances all in order and we are using their recommended solicitor. I don't see how we could have done it any quicker.

If you sell on the open market you should be in a good position to negotiate with them for some additional extras, especially if they are chasing you. We were initially told we would not get any extra contributions on top of the easy move service, but later they threw in an extra 12k to be used on options (they got wind we were looking at other properties and were pushing us to reserve)

@TheCatCameBack112 Oooh that’s so interesting! Thank you for the information. I love the idea of someone managing the chain. It all sounds a bit too pushy as we can’t move until DS does his SATs in his current school. I’ll have a chat with DH as the new builds in the new location are very spacious compared to the traditional Victorian homes. (I know that’s unusual for a developer)

It might be that we pause the whole process for a few weeks!

Thank you for the new thread!

@JoyfulSpring, did you decide whether to contact the vendor? I possibly would in your shoes, especially with your inkling that the agent isn't passing vital info on.

I'm hoping my parents' conveyancer gets moving on the searches and getting the management pack this week. I want to get all this moving along!

Waiting for my buyer to respond to our response to his request for a rather sizeable price drop following a survey we think contained a bit of copy and paste from someone else’s survey, and a few vague and incorrect claims that building works don’t have planning permission and building regs,m (they do). Fingers crossed…

Oh my goodness! What a long time.

If I don't get an answer on a time frame for completion by Wednesday I think I'm going to make contact with her. We've started packing things and I am scared it will all fall apart.

Thanks for the new thread! This is now thread no.4 for me. But hoping to exchange this week, and then hopefully complete in 2 weeks during half term (I work in a school).

We'll see.

DH has been dealing with most ofbthe solicitor aspects etc - he works from home, and is able to take calls, whereas I am in a classroom with students each day. He ia getting extremely stressed the last couple weeks (we also had a death in the family, on his side, two weeks ago), but yesterday we went and viewed the new house again, to measure up and do some final checks, and on the way home he told me that he was feeling really excited about the move, now he's seen the house again. So hopefully, the stress will be worth it.

@WimbyAce How long after your offer was accepted did your seller take to find somewhere? What is a reasonable time to keep the rest of the chain waiting?

I mean it's up to everyone to decide really. We were under offer last April, found in June and we waited for our vendor for the rest of the year and they never found (we lost 2 buyers in the meantime).
This time we had a buyer mid Jan, we got offer accepted last week and vendor also found last week. So a very different scenario!

Yes, we did have a year out in 2023 to regroup. This is now house 3 we are going for and I have lost count of the number of buyers!

Thanks @WimbyAce we are also waiting for the people we hope to buy from to find somewhere, but worried our buyers might not be as happy to wait (based on nothing other than I would get annoyed in that position!)

We have had shocking luck tbf. We struggled to find in 2021. Then we had an offer accepted on a "chain free" house in early 2022 which ended up not being chain free at all and we ended up going right to exchange before they pulled out as there was a problem with their onward purchase. Hence a year out in 2023!

Joining. I might be about to graduate on our sale but we are still searching for something to buy!

Joining from previous thread ! Hoping to exchange next week !
Started packing a bit this week and have school tours to the new area tomorrow !

Joining from the last thread.

We are hoping to get searches back this week so maybe some movement.

The longer we wait the more nervous I get and the more doubts.

I wanted a period country house, beautifully decorated with a few acres, within a village, room for a swimming pool and to keep some chickens, bees, a walled veg garden with a gorgeous wooden greenhouse, that sort of idyllic country manor scene.

We cant really afford that, but could get something close.

We have offered on a 30 year old house with little character and no acres but a large garden. Its in a town, on the edge, so we have views, but no room for animals or walled gardens! But its 5 minutes walk from the high street and walking distance of both kids schools. Logic tells me we made the right decision, but the house is smaller than our current home (we plan to extend) and the dream of acres and swimming pools has gone. There is potential to make it a magnificent home, but the effort to buy it is dragging me down let alone planning a renovation with architects, planners, building.......

I think this would not be a problem if we could just move in and get living there. But the more time to think, them more time to dream, you know, there is always a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow that could make it possible...

I thought everyone had suddenly gone very quiet, then I found this thread!😂

Random question: do you get the searches documents back from the solicitors, once they've made their report? I've only got a report on title and the original conveyance document. Should I expect to receive more?

Your doing well, we have a memorandum of sale and nothing else at all yet!

I would expect them to give you all the information they have though. If for no other reason than if you have seen them as well, if there is something they have missed they can escape blame by saying you saw the information and didn't question it.

We got all our search documentation sent alongside the final report.

Thank you both! I will request the missing documents then. Just wanted to make sure that this is what to expect!

@Hoolahoophop I was in that stage myself, then all of the sudden they dump a random bunch of stuff onto me! So hopefully it will happen for you as well very shortly. And enjoy the reading!