Inexperienced Buyer - Please Help

Dranny

Our home is currently on the market, but we don't have an offer yet.

We have offered on another property and had it accepted. That property is still on the market though as the vendor will sell to a more "proceedable" buyer if one comes in, which is fair enough. He has already bought his next property, so is really wanting to move.

I have spoken with Charcol and L&C regarding a mortgage and have narrowed down to what we want.

We are currently with The One Account, and have an agreement in principle for the amount we need, but we want to switch providers. L&C have reccomended an Alliance & Leicester product which looks good, and we will probably go with it.

As we have no offers on our house though, we haven't instructed a solicitor, or firmed up our new mortgage application.

Should we be doing this? What's the "procedure"?

Surely we can't instruct a solicitor until the property we want is "off the market"?

We're a bit confused.

If only we'd get an offer on our property!

Please advise if possible.

Dranny

AndrewSmith

My advice to you is to commit to nothing until you receive a proceedable offer on yours.

Without firm figures from your own sale you will not know exactly what your budget is or what amount of mortgage to take.

There is nothing however stopping you from getting an agreement in principle from Alliance & Leicester, in fact I would say it is essential as this will give you the amount they would be prepared to lend you based on your circumstances.

Armed with this information you will then be able to determine the 'room for manouver' you have on yours when you begion receiveing offers, and may even prompt you to drop the price slightly to get it moving.

Alliance & Leicester are a good lender and have an excellent AIP process. They can sometimes be a little slow however over the last couple of years they seem to have got to grips with this and service standards have improved.

In short:

Do not instruct the solicitor yet, as you may incur expenses without your house ever selling.

Get an AIP from Alliance & Leicester giving you the amount they will lend you. This will allow you to set your lowest offer budget.

Andy

Jorgan_2

Mostly agree with Andrew, the only thing I would look at differently is the solicitor. Many solicitors would like to get instructed earlier, thay can request info from lenders and get the basic paper work sorted out, effectivley speeding the process up for their client by 2-3 weeks. Speak to the solicitor's in your area, see how they operate, some work on a no sale no fee basis. Shop around, at least know which solicitor you want to use when you do agree a sale.

AndrewSmith

Fair point Jorgan, would agree with that my friend.

:beer:

Dranny

Thanks guys.

I forgot to mention I do have solicitors quotes locally, and will go back to them to see what they can do regards "no sale - no fee".

Dranny

Careful_girl

My suggestion is that you, as Jorgan points out, get a solicitor. I however would not be asking them to start anything yet. Thus it wouldn't matter wheter they were charging you as Andrew says. I would get a solicitor based upon recommendation if possible or upon your own criteria. Solicitors can slow the process down which can cost you more. I will probably pay an extra mortgage payment due to my collection of solicitors in the chain being inefficient. Make sure you get as many efficient people working for you as you can, to save time and money. You have no control over the other solicitors in the chain but get yourself the best.
Good Luck,
CG.:j

Dranny

Careful_girl wrote:

My suggestion is that you, as Jorgan points out, get a solicitor. I however would not be asking them to start anything yet. Thus it wouldn't matter wheter they were charging you as Andrew says. I would get a solicitor based upon recommendation if possible or upon your own criteria. Solicitors can slow the process down which can cost you more. I will probably pay an extra mortgage payment due to my collection of solicitors in the chain being inefficient. Make sure you get as many efficient people working for you as you can, to save time and money. You have no control over the other solicitors in the chain but get yourself the best.
Good Luck,
CG.:j

Simple, clear advice.

Thanks again!

Dranny