Chain complete conveyancing support thread

[BakedPotatoBeansCheeseColeslaw]

My chain completed on Monday. I’ve booked my survey, instructed my solicitor and applied for my mortgage. Now begins the anxious wait to see if we will actually get to complete.

My friend once likened moving house to the first trimester - don’t talk about it to many people until you’re sure it’s happening.

Anyone else in the same boat? We are hoping for an August completion as chain short, and onward chain was already a way through the process before falling through and us joining 🙏🏻🙏🏻

That is fantastic news! Try and allow a little flicker of hope and excitement in - it will do you good after all you’ve been through this week!

That’s great, OP!

congrats on getting the offer accepted

re rented - it s not ideal, but it has really helped with making the stress manageable especially with getting the kids in school. Without this, we would be in a sea of trouble - our buyers' buyers had a hard deadline to get in (they were being kicked out of their rental), and there was a risk of the chain collapsing.

so financially not great, but worth it for the peace of mind especially re schools (kids are at key transition points)

So fed up, our buyers have queried something else in the survey after promising the last reduction would be the last they asked for. The EA says the people coming to look for woodworm is purely for their mortgage company, which I don’t believe at all. I just have no faith in them.

How is everyone doing? We are now 14 weeks since our chain was complete. We have been told we are about to exchange 5 times now over past month but then something else comes up and pushes things back again. Really fed up with the whole move and inabilty to make any plans, just feel like we have been in limbo for so long. Children are suffering too as they don't know if they are moving school or not.

losing my mind with terrible solicitors (ours), awful communication and ridiculously slow to do anything. Started conveyancing early June and no end in sight 🙃🙃🙃 currently tearing my hair out as they have just decided there is a process to go through around verifying our deposit, no idea why they’ve only just identified this when they’ve had all the info about the deposit since July, can only presume they haven’t actually looked at the ten tonnes of info and evidence they made us load to their portal. Sob.

Sorry to hear @Martingale86 and @HouseMoveRound2 . It’s so frustrating and very hard on the kids who don’t understand why these things take so long. My niece is in a similar situation with my brother’s divorce. She knows mummy is getting a new house and keeps being told it is “soon” but “soon” never comes.

We are plodding through on the new purchase - mortgage offered, survey complete with nothing too surprising considering the age of the house and condition when we viewed, searches applied for. Got to sign the new mortgage deed this week. Can’t get too excited about it though it was too painful.

Sounds like you’re almost there then!
Can I just ask what kind of things came up on your survey?
what would you have considered an issue?

We’ve had ours and the house is older but has had a fair few things on it so just trying to figure out what is what with it! Gah!

So the things that came up that we expected were:

• the lean to is falling down, not a problem, DH can just take it down. It’s the “shelter” kind not a functioning room so not worried about that and you could tell it was dodgy on viewing
• some general repointing and a few broken roof tiles
• not enough insulation in the loft (house is 110 years old so go figure)
• the DIY on the outbuilding is of poor quality (again, we knew this and it has been marketed as storage because it’s not up to code)

The only surprising thing was:

• the rear boundary wall at the back of the garden looks like it is falling down because of a hedge. Need to establish who owns it

Things I would have run a mile from:

• evidence of subsidence
• extensive woodworm
• extensive damp

it’s hard because they are all quite scarily written but I try to remember that someone has been living in it for a long time and it’s been fine so it’s probably okay.

The only thing other I have asked is that my solicitor confirm suitable support was put in for the extension as it has removed a load bearing wall.

Thanks for this!
Ours has come back with the extension and concerns over wall ties - although I imagine if they’ve got building regs it should be fine, the roof needs sorting - tiles and chimney - getting quotes to see how extensive this work actually is. It’s probably this that’s the biggest concern as I don’t know if the sellers will want to reduce…

They found some woodworm but it could have already been treated and so would just need a guarantee and evidence of treatment otherwise we’d want this treated first.

Then the kitchen wall into dining room has had a doorway put in so need checks on if they had all the regs for that and it’s it’s structurally sound.

lots of other little bits that we expected for an older house and accepted - e.g. ceilings will need doing, conservatory roof within next couple of years.
But with the more urgent things, I’m a little worried as they were hard to negotiate with in the first place but I’m hoping they knew some things would come up on the survey and will discuss.

Never easy is it!

So fed up. Have not been able to exchange for the last week becuase different solicitors in the chain have been on holiday on different days. In the past I am sure they used to deligate to another solicitor in the office. Does this not happen anymore? It seems like an almost impossible task to ensure everyone is in and working on the same day.

It’s definitely supposed to happen! Someone has been picking up my solicitor’s emails when she has been away.

Our enquiries have been raised and the searches have started to come back! Am I allowed to get excited it might all work out this time??!

You should have someone picking it up if your solicitor is away. All three times we tried to exchange before we were successful were done by a cover solicitor although ours did then pick up on completion day. I’d be getting onto them daily about them getting it sorted!

@BakedPotatoBeansCheeseColeslaw I definitely say that you’re allowed to be a bit excited now!

Thanks both but it isn't our solicitor, it is our buyers, buyer's buyers and buyer's buyer's buyers solicitors! Everyone in the chain seems to pushing them, to no avail.

Anyone have a cat? What are you planning to do with them when you move? I had a cat run away the day before we moved 200 miles once. Turned up the day after we moved so we had a 400 mile round trip to retrieve her!

I do. I’m moving into a rental though and am getting it a week before completion, in big part to make sure I can have a week to catch her. She’s a house cat but very good at wedging herself where you can’t reach her, if you even think about putting her in a carrier.

We just moved with a cat. I transferred to the new branch of my vet’s chain and They were SO helpful and said I could leave him with them for the afternoon of the move. I was due to take him in after lunch when we were due to complete and then collect him just before they closed thst afternoon so that I wouldn’t have to worry about him being in the new house when the furniture was unloaded. It didn’t quite work out like that in the end though. I made sure I didn’t let him out on the morning of the move and locked him in the conservatory with food, drink, and his bedding, but we had a series of minor disasters and didnt end up leaving our old house until 4pm, so it was too late to take the cat to the vet by the time we arrived at the new house. I sat on the doorstep with him in his basket, and the removal company, for an hour or so until my husband arrived with the keys and then I shut him in the en-suite with his litter tray and food until things had been unloaded.

the cat was very upset and hid under a bed for a couple of days. We had intended to keep him in for at least a month, but on the eighth day I realised at lunchtime thar I’d not seen him, searched the house, and realised that he must have climbed up the side of a mattress thst was standing against a wall, jumped to get through an open upstairs window, and then jumped down into the garage roof. I was frantic and spent a couple of hours searching for him and knocking on doors. I was in the process of making posters to put up when he sauntered back in through the back door. It seemed pointless to try to keep him in after that!

I’m back again with an update and I am beyond frustrated. All conveyancing on my new onward purchase is ready and we are just trying to agree a completion date and now my buyer has gone quiet?? I’ve agreed 26th October with the seller and she’s just not participating in the conversation at all. She is a teacher so the first Monday of half term you would think would be good for her. I’m getting worried she is now going to pull out because this is what happened before - lack of commitment around dates!

I am now nearly 30 weeks pregnant, with absolutely nothing ready for baby at all because we were supposed to have moved already and I really just want to give up on the whole thing so I can start thinking about actually having a baby but I also know that would be stupid considering we’ve spent £5k already and there’s no way we could afford the same sort of house in the new year with interest rates the way they are.

I’m already going to be 33 weeks pregnant when we move, IF she agrees to that date and I just don’t know if I can do it.

It’s not me I promise @BakedPotatoBeansCheeseColeslaw but in your sellers defence, it is hard to check messages at school. Hopefully she will respond this evening. We are hoping for a half term move date too, we have a tight window with peoples holidays. I have moved when hugely pregnant and remember it well, look after yourself. It will all work out x

@Sadteacher she has agreed to the date!!

I’ve got movers pencilled in - now I’m just waiting for solicitors to hurry up and exchange. I’m so nervous - the way mortgage rates have suddenly gone we won’t be able to sensibly get another equivalent house so this really is it.

FOR FUCKS SAKE the seller has now decided they don’t fancy moving on the Monday even though they previously said any day that week would be fine 🙄🙄🙄

Surely they’ve suggested another day? Or did they just say no? My DH said we need to be firm about dates and not always caving in to others demands, easier said than done! Your agent needs to be dealing with this and getting it sorted!

They just said “another day that week”. Anyway we went around the houses and then they came back and said actually as we were we could have the date we originally agreed so all in all it was a huge waste of time!

Oh glad to hear that! I’m not convinced we will exchange this week. Surely my solicitor would have been in touch with us by now if it was a possibility? The last I heard from her was over a week ago. I suddenly thought I should get some insurance quotes just in case we do exchange this week. Again, wouldn’t she have checked if it was imminent!

Have you got an agreed moving date? We haven’t exchanged yet although I’m expecting it to happen next week we’re just waiting for our FTB to send her money to her solicitor