Is there a new thread for “Anyone putting their home on the market in early 2025”?

[IWasBornIn1989]

The other thread is full 😏

We had a rollercoaster day. The other viewer of the house we want put in an immediate offer resulting in another bidding war. They have offered more than us but the vendor has asked to take the weekend to consider both final offers. They are sale agreed to FTB so one less in the chain than us. I don’t have much hope really, we’ve already lost out twice. I can’t take the uncertainty much longer.

That’s so stressful @IWasBornIn1989 . 💐

A question: Does anyone know if it's normal practice for a seller's agent to ask a buyer for their solicitor's details immediately upon a sale being agreed or do they wait until the seller has undertaken a survey (or surveys)?

They need the solicitor details to issue the memorandum of sale. There’s no legal requirement for buyers to have a survey.

@DancingFerret yes its normal. i would say its not usually considered "official" until the solicitor details have been swapped and memo issued.

@PiercedMrsP We was in the same situation as you, knew we was going on the market and found our onward purchase immediately which was empty and no onward chain. We was on for 4 weeks with zero viewings then changed marketing from guide price to offers over and got flooded with viewings and accepted an offer from our first viewers. We’re now waiting for official mortgage offers but sold to FTBs so hoping it will be nice and easy.

4 months on the market and no viewings at all the last month despite dropping £10000 off the asking price. I genuinely think it's a lovely house in good condition in a nice village. My fixed rate has 2 years left so I'm not in an immediate rush (only selling due to divorce and can't afford to buy him out) market here seens quiet but seriously considering changing agents once the minimum term has passed. I just want to be able to move on with my life really as I feel stuck.

Why would switching to offers over make the difference? I don’t understand.

@Vie8126that's exactly what we're planning to do, swap to "offers over". We'll give it this week, see if the new photos help. At our current asking price bracket our 2-bed is really lovely but competing with some 3-beds that are less nice but have that extra bedroom. At our lower offers over bracket we'd really stand out as being the best on offer in that range. To be honest, I kind of wish we'd done that in the first place 🤦‍♀️
Congrats on getting your offer in, though, and good luck with the mortgage!

Still waiting on our survey, now that it’s the weekend it’s probably going to be Monday if not Tuesday. It’s really the last big hurdle where something could go wrong I think.
There were a few things the seller needed retrospective building control on and I was worried they were BSing when they said they had already applied but they’ve had the inspection and it’s all approved now.

Hello! Just spotted this thread and thought I'd join. 😊 We're progressing through the conveyancing journey at the moment, with the surveys having been completed this week.

Our solicitor sent us a Property Information Form to fill in. We've never had to fill one of these forms in when we've sold out previous properties. Just wondering if it's something all sellers are expected to do these days, even though it's not a legal requirement? If be interested to know if any of you have also had the joy of filling out the 32 page form?

Yeah the Property Information Form takes a few hours to fill in. Buyers Conveyancers use it as the basis for their Enquiries. Best advice is to fill it in as much as you can and as fully as possible. Otherwise you will have a load of Enquiries heading in your direction which all adds time in the process. My Vendor left gaps which took best part of two months to get answers for.

If a seller didn’t fill this out and provide it to the solicitors I would be pulling out pretty quickly to be honest! It just seems really uncooperative to not fill it in.

@IWasBornIn1989 and @StrawberryThief1930 Thank you for your replies, which have cleared up a niggle in the back of my mind about my agent; all good now.

@Gunz @Sofiewoo
I did fill it in, very thoroughly. I just asked, as when we sold our last couple of properties, we weren't asked by our solicitors to fill one in, so wondered if the form was standard practice.

@Hermioninny it sounds like all the property business is where you live 😂 sorry it's not the best situation for you, hope your offer is the one soon!

We did that form. I found it quite hard to fill in, although the guidance was helpful. Definitely say don't know if you aren't sure as it can be held to. I think things like that form are the reason some people take so long to get to exchange, if you agree an offer but spend ages filling it out or don't complete it then it will slow down the contract etc.

I've just looked at an online version of the Property Information Form; as I'm selling as an executor rather than an owner/occupier, there are very few questions I could answer with certainty. Most of my answers will be "don't know". If you were buying a probate property, would this be a problem?

It’ll delay things as it’s all stuff the solicitors will likely need to look into more.

@DancingFerret they may just ask more questions, find things from surveys. I definitely would put don't know though and let them find out rather than guess.

That's fine. I'd rather the buyers rely on their own findings rather than leave myself open to any legal proceedings further down the line.

The property is in Bristol (a two-hour drive from me) and apparently this can be a problem because of historic mining activity in the city. I was going to instruct our local "tame" solicitors, but the agent advised it would be better to use a Bristol firm as they would have local knowledge and be more readily able to overcome any problems - and I think I'll be relying on them for advice if the buyers or their solicitors want a TA6 to be completed.

@OtiMama it’s a seller’s market for sure! There’s so little available in our price bracket that everyone seems to be fighting over the same houses. One came on the market on Friday and within 15 minutes of the advert being live I was on the phone to be told 5 others had already booked viewings.

I’m hoping we’ll hear back about our offer early in the day and they don’t prolong the agony. I’m foolishly holding on to a sliver of hope but even if it’s bad news I just want to know.

Totally get just wanting to know @Hermioninny. That sounds so competitive. Opposite of here!

We had our full survey back and whilst predominantly ok it has brought a couple of bits up. The smaller header tank in the roof has had no lid on it, the water is absolutely disgusting and feeds the bathrooms. Recommended we have this emptied, cleaned and lid replaced. I have no idea on the cost for that and if it has no lid can we even get a new one or do we need a new tank! I am wondering if the tenants in there previously were using it with the lid off. The property has been empty 6 months so all heating, hot water etc has been off. The boiler was last serviced Jan 2024. Our solicitor has asked to a boiler service but said they don't have to provide one...would you put your foot down on this or just pay to have one done ourselves? We don't know whether to have it done before exchange but then would it just be a case of turning it back on when we complete. Argh I hate decisions.

We’ve had someone put an offer in… but a bit below asking price. Not a lot, about ten grand below. I’m leaning towards accepting but DH wants to refuse for no other reason than pride alone 🤦🏼‍♀️ i don’t know who im more frustrated at!

How long has your house been on the market and how quickly do you want to move?

We accepted an offer under our guide price but it still gave us enough equity to do what we wanted and we also wanted to just get on and see the house we were really interested in 😊

@OtiMama I would be putting that all back on the sellers to sort out. A boiler service in theory is straightforward but if the whole system hasn’t been used for 6 months who’s to say whether it will actually work when it is turned on again. I would possibly compromise and say you’ll pay for the service prior to exchange but if any repairs are required those will be passed back to the seller to deal with.

The property form I filled in for our sale requires evidence of recent boiler service and any other gas appliances and if not done they’re expected to be updated.

We had another crazy day. Desperately waiting to hear from estate agent and they called to say vendor wanted another couple of days to think about things. Then half an hour later another call to say our offer has been accepted!! I don’t know what changed their mind but I’m over the moon. Fingers crossed for smooth sailing from here.