Can we move garden items in before completion and collecting keys? Empty house purchase.

[Pineapplewhip]

We're due to complete on our house on Wednesday next week. We're first time buyers so naive to the process! I stupidly thought that at 8am that Wednesday we could stroll into the estate agents and collect keys. Nope - we have to wait for monies to be transferred and clear!? Ugh.

The property is empty - it was a probate sale and the family selling are away on a cruise. So they 100% wont be doing any last goodbyes to the house that morning.

Could we just open the back gate and put all of our garden stuff away that morning to start with, whilst we are waiting for them to call us and tell us to collect the keys? I don't want to waste the whole day when we could be moving shit about! Ive agreed to borrow a van from a friend but I have to give it back Tuesday night!

I wasn't planning on asking permission because obviously the estate agent would say no just to cover themselves.

Wwyd?
YABU - you have to wait
YANBU - nobody is there, just get cracking

You could ask your solicitor to transfer funds the day before so you get keys first thing. Ours suggested this they just asked we have the house insurance from that day so could be an option?

We got our keys at 9am on the day of completion, also first time buyers buying an empty house. The estate agents said they'd never had anyone in so early to pick up keys :-)

It is not your property yet. So no you cannot.
You might want to say to yourself but it is empty etc. You don’t actually know what may be happening. A relative who is not on the cruise might be popping around to do last minute checks. To make sure the meters are read etc.
They likely will have insurance which covers the house. You don’t. And cannot get it either. If someone nabbed your garden furniture you would lose it.
But the overriding principle that should govern your behaviour is respect for someone else’s property. It is not your property yet. It still belongs to someone else.

You can arrange a key undertaking with your solicitor. It’s a simple form, we had one three weeks before we moved into our current house. Meant we could clean and decorate a few of the bedrooms before we moved in.

That’s not quite true - after exchange the buyer is obliged the buy the property in whatever state it’s in so if they damaged it, it’s on them, which is why you are told you insure your purchase from exchange not completion.

They likely won’t have insurance, OP should.

www.gocompare.com/home-insurance/guide/home-insurance-between-exchange-and-completion/

If you are selling a house that is empty due to probate issues you often ( we did ) have to have empty house insurance. So yes, in all likelihood. So you don’t get squatters basically.

I would and have.

You just need to ask the vendor not Mumsnet 😁

Yes, the Solicitor should have their contact details. Even if they are on a cruise.
Or details of any other relatives that might be nearby to deal with anything. And presumably knows when they are due back from their cruise. Bit odd to go away at such a time. But ask before doing.

You can absolutely get the EA to ask the vendor. We did this and ours were absolutely fine for us to start moving gardening bits across the morning of completion.

Nope not until monies have been transferred, as yes everything has exchanged etc but until monies have been exchanged its not legally yours.

I work for a builders and we have people turning up before monies have gone through expecting to just start moving their stuff into their new house, doesnt work like that.

If you speak to your solicitor they can try to push it throufh early if they are a good solicitor.

Some people get confused about the difference between exchange and completion it seems. However, they can happen on the same day.
I'd think it was quite low risk to put all your garden stuff there a day early and it helps to get some stuff out of the way but it's a bit cheeky/illegal....ha! I presume you just mean a bench and some plant pots etc not a scale replica of Windsor Castle. Ask the EA or solicitor.

You have to have insurance on the house you purchase between exchange and purchase. Once you have exchanged the sellers are just holding the property until completion.

The previous house we were buying we hadn't exchanged and they left the water on in an empty house and it froze and flooded. If we had exchanged contracts it would've been on our insurance. I'm very thankful we hadn't!

But until completion there is always a risk someone will pull out and forfeit their deposit. And dates of completion can and do change. So on balance I would wait until completion before moving anything in

We got held up on our present sale by a day because our solicitor had an afternoon work do. Was an empty house too. Lucky our removal company were great and took our stuff back to their base, plugged our fridge in overnight and delivered our stuff on a Saturday morning without charging us extra. The solicitor, on the other hand, charged us overtime rates. Absolute shark. We were lucky to have somewhere to stay as well as we shifted over 100 kms away.

Word of advice @Pineapplewhip whatever happens with the garden stuff your very first job on getting into the house should be to get all the beds you will need ready, and fully made up. The last thing you want to do on the late evening of moving day is to start making beds, far better to have them ready so you can collapse when you have reached exhaustion point,

Enjoy your new home.

No, it’s not yours until the money has been exchanged!

The two sales I know of where there was a significant delay in getting keys to the property were due to the availablity of the mortgage for the first time buyer at the start of the chain.

You need to make sure that your solicitor has all of your money before you complete to hopefully mean it will run smoothly.

My bil was on the verge of penalties for late completion because the first time buyers mortgage hadn't come through. He was moving himself and ended up having to moving his belongings from his flat to his parents house and then to his new house as there was a fairly reasonable chance he wasn't going to get the keys that day. I think most of it went the day after from recollection

Meh, I’d do it! When we bought our house, the estate agent manager was a friend of my FILs so they gave us the keys at 9am on the morning of completion as soon as they opened (also iirc the seller okayed it). Funds didn’t clear until 2pm in the afternoon 🫢

OP does have insurance on the property; it says that in a previous post. What makes you think it wouldn't be possible to get insurance? It's totally normal procedure to arrange insurance from the time of exchange, not just completion.

We sold last year to someone who was a cash buyer living in rented accommodation and the sale completed at 9.45am. The contract stated that we had to vacate by 2pm but from 9.45 the estate agent was in our ears about vacating straight away, stating that the house legally didn’t belong to us anymore and the buyer could come and ask us to get out straight away.
They then gave us until noon and I was locking the door at 11.59am, just as the buyer was pulling up outside. She then informed us that we could’ve taken our time as she wasn’t planning on moving in for another month.

We were moving ourselves with a couple of large vans so drove to where we were moving to, over an hour away, before the money had transferred to the house builders we were purchasing from. Thankfully I had a call to say our purchase had completed when I was a mile away from the new house, otherwise we’d have just had to sit and wait with two vans full, a car and a puppy. This was around 1.15pm and there wasn’t any building society involvement to slow things down either as we were also cash buyers.

When we sold our house, once the contracts were signed we gave the keys to our buyer first thing in the morning so she could start moving. Unfortunately as we were buying a new house, we had to wait until 5pm in the evening (end of the chain) until the money had been transferred, to move into it, despite it being empty and contracts exchanged.

We were both teachers so only get 1 day to move house so we didn't bother booking it for this day as we knew it probably wouldn't be until late in the day. We rented a van, filled it and then spent the evening moving our stuff in.

You could always ask the question as we were happy for our buyer to have the keys and start moving

The couple who were buying my parents' house (which was empty) brought a whole load of garden stuff a couple of days before the entry date. Sale fell through.

Completion is usually between 12-2pm, vacant possession can be a couple of hours earlier.

The solicitors have to confirm the CHAPS and update the estate agent to release the keys.

It is unlikely to fall through and the owners being away should not cause an issue. (If they cancelled the sale after exchange you might be able to take, costly legal action they would not want to pay for).

It is frustrating but it is the process. You may be considered trespassing and it really is not worth the potential hassle.