It's all so very sad (not so much for us but for the vendors). We are moving from London to Dublin. We found a lovely house and had an offer accepted before Easter. We didn't exchange contracts straight away because the survey raised a few issues that we wanted to be checked out and have a slight price reduction to cover things that would need to be fixed straight away.
The vendors wanted to stay in the house for the summer and complete in the last week of August. DS will be starting school there at the beginning of Sept so the timing's a little tight for us, but workable.
The wife of the elderly couple selling has suddenly fallen very seriously ill. The husband wants to continue with the sale but push back completion to an, as yet undefined, date in October, or possibly later. Plus he wants to exchange contracts by the end of Friday.
I feel so sorry for them but it really puts us in a difficult position. I don't want to rent somewhere for 6 or 8 weeks and then move again, short term lets the right area would be difficult to find anyway. The house price is right at the limits of what we can afford and renting certainly won't help the finances. I really don't want to get to the completion date and then be in a position of feeling that I'm turfing a seriously ill woman or, even worse, a grieving widower out of their home.