FTB- are things going TOO smoothly?!

lv565

Hi, we have also just bought our first house. The contracts were exchanged yeaterday and we move in tomorrow!
We opted to pay our mortgage on the 1st of each month.
We are about to give notice on our rented house - we pay the rent on the 12th of the month. (our final payment should go out on Monday but we wont give they keys back until 12th October)
We were told by the mortgage advisor (Clydesdale bank) that they do not take the first mortgage payment for at least 6 weeks after you move in. I think we will pay our first payment on 1st Nov. This is great as we pay nothing in October so that the mortgage payment for 5/6 weeks in November is not too bad!
Hope this helps and good luck!

Our sale has gone very smoothly and on Saturday it will be exactly 7 weeks since we had the offer accepted!

Soot2006

We also had a smooth purchase
-- 6 weeks between first viewing & completion
--- Terrifying! We gave notice before exchange so there were only two weeks overlap. A gamble that luckily paid off or we'd have had to move out anyway haha!

LandyAndy

We were in a rental a few years back and then bought on the same street (a house needing quite a lot of cosmetic work inside). We arranged to exchange a couple of days before the end of April allowing us to give notice to end the tenancy at the end of May. We then completed on 9 May and had just over two weeks to redecorate throughout the top floor (so much easier in an empty house) before having our furniture delivered from store and moving in on 28 May. That conveniently left us with 3 days to have the rental thoroughly cleaned and move things back to where they had been when we moved in (fully furnished).

LandyAndy

lv565 wrote: »

Our sale has gone very smoothly and on Saturday it will be exactly 7 weeks since we had the offer accepted!

Most sales do, give or take the odd minor hiccup, but very few people start threads to say that they haven't got anything to complain / worry about.:rolleyes:

JellyIcecream

thanks to all the replies - i know im just being silly worrying about things going smoothly but since my life prior to this has never been a smooth ride, i just got scared/nervous that things were going so well and seems like im just waiting for the bad thing to happen!
we are still awaiting our homebuyers report from the surveyors (apparently its been sent so i guess its just stuck in the postal strike!) but he called me the other day and said that he couldn't see any major problems with the house, just a few minor issues and also that the roof wld probably need replacing at some point only cos its the orginial one to the house!(built in 1930s).
So i guess its just a waiting game at the moment.
I did call my sols and ask if they had any info from sellers sols as to when they were likely to want to complete by but my sols said they hadnt heard anything.

Im still in two minds about my rental notice. my tenancy starts on 10th of each month so i was going to say to landlord that i wld terminate on or around the 24th (which wld give me 6 weeks) but having heard so many stories about when it goes wrong, im tempted to just say i'll leave on 10th nov and swallow the financial cost. the money i'll save from not having to pay rent will go nicely towards decorating etc but if its at a cost of having the possibility of nowhere to stay, i dont think i could swallow that ....

JellyIcecream

finally spoke to my sols today and got them to ring the sellers sols to see if they can provide a timeline.
apparently, the sellers are buying a retirement home and the paperwork hasnt even come thru for that yet! their sols reckon once the paperwork comes thru, it'll be about 6 weeks from then.

so looks like our hope of getting everything sorted by first half of oct is not going to happen ... looking more like november now unless the sols go on turbo!

.........

JellyIcecream

well things have kinda slowed down a lot since the whole process started.

the homebuyers report took ages to get to us cos of the royal mail strike and i only managed to send it to my sols last thursday.

reading the report, there aren't many issues (i think/hope!) but things like the gas/elec etc are a bit old and may require checking, and there is an issue about whether building regs/planning permission was sought when the chimney breast was removed in the back room etc.

hopefully my sols can give me an insight into how bad/serious it is and if its nothing that bad, things can move on.

its just going so SLOWWWWWWWwwww now.

JellyIcecream

*update*

spoke to our sols a couple of weeks ago who informed us that the vendors sols have said they have not received any paperwork still for their retirement purchase and they didnt have any idea as to when these would come.
Obviously wasnt good news to us as things had been going quite well until then but we had resigned ourselves to waiting it out.
Went to our sols on Monday to sign the paperwork so its all ready when needed and again our sols said they hadnt had any news from vendors sols.
When i got home, i thought I'd email the estate agent and basically said to him that given the lack of information and no timeline given by the vendors sols,we are suitably concerned things may fall thru, therefore if there were any properties that come onto the market, we would be interested to have a look ...
An hour later, the EA calls me and says as far as he knew, things were going ok and the vendors had already started packing! but he'd talk to vendors and get back to me.
By late afternoon, he called back. Said that the vendors were concerned about the information i had been given and they'd popped into the EA to show him the paperwork they'd received already, apparently they'd already received the draft contract for their purchase and as far as they were aware, they were looking at a couple of weeks max to sort out exchange date!
Well. Talk about two different pieces of info!
They couldnt get hold of the vendors sols but hopefully today someone can and find out whats going on!
As i pointed out to EA, i rent so need an idea of timeline and to be fully informed but seems like vendors sols are not being very good on this.
The poor vendors (old couple) want to move asap too
So no one has any idea what is going on!
Its been a rollercoaster few days and the ride is going on until someone can tell us something concrete.
damn sols!

sarah_elton

keith969 wrote: »

Just say you need a month from exchange to completion - then put your rental notice in on exchange.

Agree that you shouldn't give notice on your rental until exchange - before that you have no guarantee that the house will be yours.

However, although it's a month's notice on rentals, you normally have to give notice to a rent day.

Supposing you pay rent on the 20th of each month, for that date until the 19th of the following month.

If you give notice on, say, 25th October, most landlords would then expect to receive rent on 20th November; so you are paying for the property until 19th December.

So, if exchange happens a week or two after your rent date, go for longer than a month between exchange and completion or you could have quite a long overlap where you're paying for both properties.

Having said that, I went from rented to bought and had a week's overlap. It was great - there were some minor bits of painting that needed doing and I could do them while the property was empty. Also gave me a chance to give the new place a very thorough clean. And move the day before my tenancy ended, so I could then go back and clean the rented place once empty, before handing the keys back.

p.s. Because there's a chain above you things may go slower than you'd like. If you can be patient it'll all go through fine, don't worry. Because there are a few parties to please, you may also have to be a little flexible, within a few days, on exchange/completion dates. If it comes to that, don't get too hung up on the costs involved (unless it means a whole extra month's rent or something). These things work best if everyone has a bit of give and take in them.

morg_monster

hey this is all really interested. another FTB here, just got our offer accepted yesterday, hugely exciting isn't it!
We are also in rented with 1 months notice, and our chain is short (our vendors are buying a new place with no chain). Our rent is paid on the 15th so probably by nov 15th will be too soon to exchange, so will probably be looking to give notice in december. Think the vendors are hoping to move before christmas so will mean a big overlap but thats probably good as long as we budget for it, we have NO furniture of our own so will give us plenty of time to decorate, fill the house etc - ooh christmas sales too! John Lewis Clearance here I come!