How long does it take to book a survey?

sidtrix

Had an offer accepted on our flat, wanted the buyers to book a survey asap to make sure the offer was genuine however 2 weeks on and still no survey. They have taken mortgage thru our estate agent and he says all fees have been payed upfront by them but no date has been set for survey yet as that is to be set by mortgage company...
What timeframes does it take to book a survey (when I bought my place, it just took a couple of days) can the buyers not call mortgage company to chase them or am I just being impatient?

Cheers

silvercar

Depends which way round the mortgage company operates. Some will do the credit checks etc first and then book the survey when everything else has been approved. This means the buyers won't be wasting the survey fee if the checks don't conform to lenders requirements.

Doesn't mean your buyers can't chase the company up.

Jorgan_2

The buyers can chase their mortgage broker to try & get things moving. Put pressure on the Agent, if it was a condition of the offer being accepted, he can put pressure on the broker concerned.

spottydog

We had the same happen to us last year when we were selling our place. The estate agent kept saying they had paid everything for the mortgage and it was just the mortgage compaynbeing slow so not to worry since the buyers were going through their mortgage broker. After a month I had enough and we said we were putting the property back on the market until the survey had taken place. The next day the buyers pulled out as no-one was willing to lend them the amount of money they required. My estate agents knew since they had approached a number of mortgage providers (the only bit of truth the estate agents seemed to give was that they were using thier broker, the bit about paying the monies was they completed the credit card details part on the application form).

Personally I would give no more than 10 worknig days then tell the agent if it is not booked within 2 days the place should be readvertised (although you are willing to sell to the buyers at the agreed price should no other party complete their survey before them).

Woby_Tide

we paid mortgage co. for survey(homebuyers) last Tuesday, survey was done on Wednesday (Nationwide instructed Countrywide Surveyors to do it), received report on Saturday

Debt_Free_Chick

sidtrix wrote:

Had an offer accepted on our flat, wanted the buyers to book a survey asap to make sure the offer was genuine however 2 weeks on and still no survey. They have taken mortgage thru our estate agent and he says all fees have been payed upfront by them but no date has been set for survey yet as that is to be set by mortgage company...
What timeframes does it take to book a survey (when I bought my place, it just took a couple of days) can the buyers not call mortgage company to chase them or am I just being impatient?

Cheers

Are they having a survey or just a mortgage valuation? If a valuation, then the surveyor will more than likely just do a "drive by" and not even visit your property.

It's only if they've asked for a Homebuyers or Structural Survey that you can be sure of a visit from the surveyor. But, if they'd done that, I'd expect them to arrange that separately from the mortgage.

Best to be sure exactly what they've arranged.

magali

I am a 1st time buyer and after I put an offer I got in touch with Nationwide through my broker 2 days later but it took almost 3 wek before we got the survey done (home buyer report).
I don't know why it was so long, maybe because of the buying season!
The survey was done by john hollingsworth.