I will try to keep this as simple as possible: we listed our house in Wiltshire in August last year, looking to move back to our home county of Hampshire as we weren't happy with our daughter's school, and to be near family, and my partner and I's work. We accepted an offer at the beginning of October (a couple put their flat on the market in order to offer on our house), we then started looking for a house in the town we wanted to live. We had more equity and were finally able to afford a much more expensive house in a town we have always wanted to live. Property in this town does not often come up and we were very lucky to have our offer accepted on our dream house, it went to best and finally and we went way over to secure it. Our sellers then took a long time to find an onward house; securing an offer at the beginning of February. The whole time our estate agent (who is managing our sale and our buyer's sale), said that the person at the bottom buying the flat was nearly there, along with everyone else. When finally early March I got a call to say the onward chain (of which there are 3 more houses!) were all ready to exchange. A call with our estate agent then revealed that actually the flat enquiries at the bottom were not finished! Not only that, but their mortgage had expired. The entire chain was working to the information that the earliest mortgage to expire was 4th May. Obviously we were furious and very stressed. The estate agent had been keeping this quiet so as not to freak anyone out... safe to say, I was freaked out.
The upshot is, the single outstanding enquiry on the flat is to satisfy the mortgage lender, regarding some painting work to the internal communal area in the flat. I am in contact directly with our buyer now and she is chasing an answer from the management company like crazy - she has been great but I am mindful I can push her too hard for information and updates. The buyer's lender appear to want to know exact figures of how much works will be and what plan is in place and responsibility for future works, which seems a perfectly reasonable ask. The management company however are not really answering the question directly, and the bank refuse to proceed.
It has been rumbling on for weeks now and we are terrified we are going to lose our house. I have a very good rapport with the onward estate agent and I have made clear that we are worried about losing the onward house, I have been updating him with all the information I can get as we no longer trust the other estate agent. Our sellers are happy to wait, for now, but I worry that if this continues they are going to cut us loose. I just don't know what to do. The buyer at the bottom has reapplied for their mortgage with the same lender, so that is less of an issue but the enquiry I am starting to worry is one that, quite honestly, will never be satisfied.
I have attached the question the bank has asked in black, and the answer from the management company in red, which has been rejected. I have no other information and day after day is going by with no update from anyone. I have messaged our buyer for an update but she has not responded to me and I don't want to chase her.
My partner and I are starting to wonder whether we are going to be tied to this flat and its issues if we continue for too much longer? At what point do we discuss a deadline on the flat and dropping our buyer (as much as we don't want to do that to them as it is also their dream house). Do we hang in there in the hope that somehow this enquiry is answered? or is a question like this from the bank, and a management company who are clearly not going to come up with a cost and plan of works any time soon, a problem that will just go on and on? At what point do we say enough is enough? Is this a common problem with flats, and is there a work around?
Please be kind, we are not experts in this field and we are climbing the walls with stress at the moment. What would you do?