The all new buyers/sellers waiting room (9) the one where we start to wonder if we'll move by Christmas..

[NeverGoingToMove]

Huge apologies if I have missed this thread, I have searched high and low but don't think another was started after number 8 ended in May.

After a seriously stressful encounter with building control, I think we are almost ready to exchange. After going on the market last July, I'm hoping we'll move before our year anniversary!

How is everyone else doing?

Yay @UndertheMapleTree. Thanks everyone, we also exchanged yesterday! Feels like such a relief. We move next Thursday. Feels like so much to sort out.

Confirmed and paid the deposit for removals today, so that's another thing ticked off.

@unicornpower sorry you are being ignored. I would definitely try calling as well. How are some people so useless at their job - wonder if these companies actually want to be paid! Hope you can get some answers soon.

Totally agree with @notanarchaeologist - I kept speaking to both the EA and solicitor. Had weekly updates and would then chase back if needed depending on what we were waiting for. Ours has gone through fairly quickly but tbh I think it helps we have such a small chain, therefore we had access to information at both ends.

@OtiMama hurrah! So pleased you got it over the line! I finally got a response, the sale progressor is on holiday and although the EA denies it, nothing has been chased so it’s just been left. I’ve asked her to chase it tomorrow and looped the solicitors in as I just don’t believe anything our EA says! Hopefully the solicitor can put some pressure on.

enjoy the celebrating!

Congratulations @UndertheMapleTree and @OtiMama, the end is in sight!

I had an interesting conversation with the sales progessor today. The buyer at the bottom of the chain is pushing hard for a completion date at the end of August. We’ve still had absolutely no contact from our seller’s solicitor. Turns out the bottom of the chain solicitor is also our seller’s solicitor so is now effectively holding up her own client’s sale! To add to the fun our buyer’s solicitor told the sales progressor that they want a survey done. We accepted their offer almost 13 weeks ago and they’ve not booked anything yet!

@unicornpower I just never understand why they don't want to chase it though, no sale the EA gets no money!

@Hermioninny what does the EA say about the lack of contact from your seller's solicitor? Argh it's so annoying, our buyer did that, booked a survey after waiting...and just at the point of signing!

@OtiMama they weren’t impressed as they’d also left messages for them! Our EA is the agent for our buyers house, our house and our seller’s house so I do think they should have picked up on it a bit quicker but the sales progressor was on holiday and I think now they’re involved things might speed up. Just hope it doesn’t end up being our mortgage that holds it all up.

Can I get some opinions on this. We finally exchanged last week (similarly to @Hermioninny our buyers and sellers were using the same solicitors and no-one noticed until I did!) and are moving next week. The house we are moving to is empty and needs a lot doing to it. Obviously we have taken out insurance for the building and contents (ie our contents which we are moving in) so any damage before completion would be our problem to sort out.

We have asked if we can move a few bits in early. It would be a huge help as we have a lot to do, I want to ensure our house is good to go as soon as possible on moving day for our buyers, and it seems like a no-brainer to take a couple of car loads of stuff round.

The agents have reported that the sellers have said no. No reason given.

Is this reasonable? The sellers have been difficult the whole way through and I had hoped that once we were exchanged they would relax. The legal process was painfully slow because of them. The house has been empty the whole time (and no doubt the condition deteriorating).

DH and I have accepted it and cursed all we can, but I just cannot fathom why the sellers would do this. What do they have to gain?

Has anyone else had this? I am worried the sellers are going to do something odd to the house before we move in.

@Crouton19 I think that the sellers are right. You could potentially damage their house then refuse to go through with the sale or move in and not complete. Any solicitor would advise against it so I don't think they are being unreasonable.

@Crouton19 I can understand your train of thought but I don’t think they’re being difficult. We sold a house previously where we were breaking the chain and had moved out before completion, our buyer asked to go in and clean before moving and our solicitor advised against it. If anything were to happen it’s very difficult to establish who’s fully responsible.

@OtiMama same here, considering we are almost a year in (previous sale fell through) you’d think she’d just want rid of us and to get it over the line but she doesn’t seem to want to be all that helpful. Hopefully the solicitors can nudge.

Ok thanks for the alternative opinions, it is useful to hear the other side. The agents thought it should be fine and the solicitors are the firm the agents recommend (and possibly get some commission for), and we would have put things in the garage under the watchful eye of the agent so really no scope for damage (and even if there was, we've contracted to buy it) but I can see there is a tiny risk for them. It just feels like they could have done this one helpful thing, having been so slow the whole way through that our buyers nearly walked away. 😔

I’m absolutely fuming, our EA emailed this morning saying she had left messages with the estate agents at the bottom of the chain and no one was getting back to her etc. I called them myself (again) and lo and behold, they answered straight away and gave me a full update. Basically there is still one outstanding enquiry on the lower chain so they are not in a position to talk dates. I could honestly tear my hair out! The lower chain are now nearly 20 weeks into this process, how is there STILL enquiries?! But I’m just so cross with our estate agent, she clearly hasn’t done due diligence, not that I could ever prove it! I don’t know why she wouldn’t?

Joining if I may. We’re only 4 weeks post offer acceptance so much earlier in the process than many on this thread.

Probably a silly question but we had a L3 survey earlier this week, the chimney needs repointing, it’s causing moisture in the loft meaning the polystyrene and boarding needs to be removed and replaced too. What do I do?! Get quotes from a roofer? Tell the agent? Tell the solicitors? Ask for a price reduction or the vendors to solve? We could potentially swallow half of the cost so as not to lose the purchase but I don’t know what the ‘done’ thing is.

I think the done thing is whatever you want to do. We have significant structural issues and I’m definitely going to be asking for a reduction in price. We are just doing other surveys first so we can work out how bad it is. We will take on some of the costs ourselves but not all. (We are talking tens of thousands). A structural engineer gave us a rough idea of costs. We will work on the basis of that.

@DancingGal can share our experience - our chimney also needs repointing. Our buyers obtained quotes and then asked for a reduction in price to reflect the quotes, which we accepted. We could have also obtained our own quotes and done the work, possibly for slightly less than they asked to have it reduced by, but in the moment it felt easier to renegotiate the price and let them handle the repairs!

HTH.

We exchanged today!! Completion in two weeks.

Feel like the stone that's been sat in my stomach the last month has finally disappeared. At the same time we're all feeling sad that this is now officially it; the end of an era in this house. It was our first family home, the children were born here (genuinely here, in the lounge), first steps and days of school, first sleepovers, all that jazz.

Super excited about what is to come, it absolutely is the best move for us, but it's going to be an emotional goodbye!

@notanarchaeologist yayyyyyyyyy!!! That’s such good news, congratulations!! I totally know what you mean about the house being so special, I know I will be the same, our dog was a puppy here, my children were babies and took their first steps here- so bittersweet!

can I ask thoughts on this please - we are in a small chain and offers accepted/chain completed approx 4 weeks ago. Since then we have done searches/survey/mortgage offer and onto enquiries post searches on our onward property. Our buyer seems to have done very little. Our solicitors say they haven’t had any enquiries at all since sending the initial forms etc across to theirs at end June. I’m not sure what to think.

It was all chased up yesterday by estate agent but I’m wondering if we ought to be issuing a deadline and threatening to go back on the market, it doesn’t scream ‘committed buyer’ to me. Doesn’t help that it’s now peak summer holiday time I guess. I’m concerned that we’ll be almost ready to exchange on purchase and the sale not having progressed at all. Am I expecting too much? I’m aware that I’m super organised and ‘on it’ and not everyone is…

We were in a very similar position and I wish I'd been as proactive as you and got the estate agent involved/chasing earlier. We just kinda 'trusted the process', wasn't something I'd recommend doing!

In our case it turned out our buyers solicitors hadn't properly on boarded them, so they thought they were all good and were waitng to hear from the solicitors with next steps, and the solicitors were waiting for them to sign a page on a document before they could start searches and all the rest of it. Total communication fail, added a month to the whole process. Sadly wasn't the end of the saga by any stretch of the imagination, but that's another story.

Think getting onto the EA is a good first step. It might all be innocent (although annoying) and the buyers are keen, just clueless!

Thanks, for a few reasons I’m edging to thinking they are keen but a bit clueless about the process - it was actually our solicitor who chased it first via the EA (I’ve been really impressed by the solicitor so far), but I think we’re going to follow up again next week and then maybe suggest a deadline for seeing some ‘progress’ - assuming still none of course - hopefully things will happen soon. I don’t really want to go back on the market - but I really really don’t want to waste money on solicitors fees for a purchase that doesn’t happen because the buyers pull out after a few months either!

@notanarchaeologist we also exchanged today and complete in two weeks - congratulations!

I'm also feeling a but apprehensive, we've lived in our house 8 years now but it's a new build so we're the only owners so far.

I know that moving is the right thing though 😊

Blergh. I’m still here! It’s been bloody awful. We are (possibly/maybe) on the right track now. We’ve accepted an offer on ours (again 🤦‍♀️) and we’ve had an offer accepted on a house we absolutely love (again!). It needs the shit knocking out of it but I can’t get excited and start planning because I have totally lost faith in the process 🤯

Please could I join you? We’ve accepted an offer on ours about a month ago. We’re in the slightly un nerving position of not having an estate agent, and we haven’t sold a house for over 20 years. We already own where we’re moving to, so have already moved a lot of stuff. But our solicitor said it may be slightly slower as it’s a complicated house - well water and septic tank etc.

@Getamoveon2024 i feel you completely. I think we are on the brink of a chain collapse (again)

does anyone have any experience of price reductions? We had an update that due to a price negotiation that ended in a reduction, the bank has requested to do another reinspection of the property. Is this normal? It seems to me that they are worried about the valuation and could refuse to lend? I hoch obviously will end in a chain collapse. I keep trying to be positive but I’m running out of positivity.

Just an FYI This isn’t our property, it’s one lower down the chain!

Well, almost 3 months into the process, it looks very likely that our chain is about to collapse. 😕

Our buyers have dragged their feet for weeks and weeks on end, not booking their survey while conveyancing enquiries were being done, and one or two minor issues were sorted out, despite us constantly practically pleading with them to do so to avoid holding up the chain. We have literally been so frustrated with the lack of communication we feel like we have been banging our heads against a brick wall. Despite relaying our fears to our agents that our buyers and their solicitors are painfully slow to respond and make decisions, we have been made to feel like we are overreacting and that this length of time is 'normal'.

On Friday we received a call from our sellers agents to say our sellers are at real risk of losing their forward sale as their seller is no longer willing to wait. The chain at the top are all ready to exchange and complete. So its us and our buyers that are the only ones not ready.

We relay this information back to our estate agent who makes some calls and discovers that no only have our buyers not booked a survey, that no searches have been applied for either!!! 3 months in!!! Can you believe this? I was honestly just gob smacked. What the hell have they been doing all this time and why are we only finding this out now??!!

We were then given the ultimatum of moving things forward or our seller puts our forward purchase back on the market, but we can't move forward until our buyer does!! So we are in between a rock and a hard place.

We have relayed the urgency to our buyers and their solicitor and asked for searches to be applied for and expedited and surveys booked to appease everyone and try and keep this fragile chain from breaking. Still very little movement.

I am honestly done with this process. What the hell do we do now? Do we wait for our buyers to catch up and then look for somewhere else ourselves? Do we go back on the market and try and find another buyer bearing in mind property here is very very slow to sell and it took us 7 months to find this buyer.