Buying a house in Scotland

[52andblue]

I currently have a house here but bought 25 years ago & I can't really remember.

I have seen a house I'd like to buy. I'd need to sell mine but it would take a bit of time to get it presentable & on the market so it could be up to 6m for final sale.

I asked the seller if that's ok & apparantly it is as she has somewhere to go, is flexible & not in a hurry (her house is lovely but unusual & may not sell quickly)
We have discussed my renting her house whilst mine is on the market so I can move young people across sooner (different part of Scotland).

So what I want to ask please is: if I offered with a 6month entry date (she says is ok) at what point would missives be concluded? I do not want to mess her around at ALL I just cant remember how it works, & how this would tie in with a potential rent first?

I can't call an agent to ask until Monday so I thought I'd ask here.

Your usually strongly advised not to sign missives until your house sells if you are contingent on sale. So once your buyer has signed then you can sign.

@Starbright102 Thank you. I guess I have to hope that the buyer will accept an offer on those terms.

I've bought and sold a few times in the past 10 years and more recently the missives were concluded a couple of days before we got the keys.

We sold up in England and were renting in Scotland. Our seller was moving in with family so there was no chain. We concluded 4 weeks after the offer was accepted.

Unless you can fund the purchase ( and the Additional dwelling supplement) you are strongly advised not to conclude purchase missives without concluding sale missives
If you do and there is an issue with your sale you will be in breach of contract on your purchase and can be sued
Bear in mind your purchaser might have to sell and /or get a mortgage and you could end up in a chain
Make your offer subject to sale and hop the seller bears with you

As a PP said, missives are typically concluded much closer to final sale/keys day now - often just a day or two before now. So you make your offer subject to sale of your property.

The more complicated thing will be arranging a rental contract on top of that. You’ll both want legal advice on that aspect.

Our last two purchases have been for cash, not dependent on the sale of our property. We signed missives a couple of days before completion in both cases. We had agreed the completion date in advance. Our last sale fell through twice between accepting the offer and signing missives so the Scottish system isn’t as foolproof as people suggest any more.
I think renting before purchase would need legal advice. I wouldn’t be keen if I was the vendor. If nothing else there would be extra legal fees and potentially the property would not meet all the regulations for renting.

Thank you everyone who has replied.
I will make an offer with a long date subject to sale of my property. And HOPE.

re the rental option: the seller has another property in France, plus a son who lives locally on a farm & says she could move to either if I was serious about buying (I am & will drop asking price of my house to speed things up if necess)

The house I want to buy needs work so would not meet current rental regs. I'm fine with that but I dont' know if that would put a spanner in the works legally.
Obviously we would both need something in writing about a potential rental.
If it's too tricky I can just store everthing at this end but it would be nice to have access sooner rather than later (can clean house, work on garden, move across in stages rather than one fell swoop)

I'm going to put an offer in subject to conditions tomorrow.
Here's hoping ...

Remember it’s your solicitor who will put in the offer, so you’ll need to explain exactly what it is you want them to tell the seller’s solicitor.

@IDasIXThanks. Can I use the same solicitor to put in an offer as I would then use to sell my house?

Yes