Buyer wants to complete in 14 days and we're not ready...what do we do?

skintchick

Our house sale/purchase has been pootering along OK, with us being the slowest link in the chain, not that we've been slow but everyone else is champing at the bit!

to cut a long story short, our buyer, who we thought had already sold her house and emigrated, as she is buying ours as an investment, phoned me direct tonight to say they aren't completing on their sale and emigrating till this purchase is done and dusted and as their kids start school abroad in September, they want to complete in two weeks. :eek:

In theory this is doable but we are about to commisison a full survey into our purchase, as an issue with the roof has been flagged and while we have the mortgage agreed we want to know what we're looking at, plus we have a baby and so it's not so easy to find time to pack.

So the question is, do removals firms pack stuff up for you? and if so how much might they charge for the privilege?

And if you were my buyer, would you be mightily miffed if I suggested you complete on your sale and emigrate, then continue doing the purchase of ours remotely. Which is what we thought they were doing and I'm a bit mystified as to why they aren;t, to be honest.

arby

they're giving you (probably) hundreds of thousands of pounds. How much do you want that? It's not their fault that you've only just got round to getting a full survey done. I'm assuming you need to sell your house, which means you don't want to put off the only person currently in a position to buy it.

skintchick

Actually they are getting a bargain, we could sell it for more, there is a huge back story to this, and no it's not their fault but it's not ours either, we've done everything as quick as we can and it's not our fault they haven;t sold theirs and emigrated and bought their investment from their new home abroad. We could have delayed things but we've done everything same day as far as possible (ie except when we went on holiday last week) and I think it's a touch unreasonable to expect us to pack up in 14 days' time all of a sudden when they've never mentioned this before.

Doozergirl

Do you think they would allow you a short term rental agreement or something? It's not the norm but if they're desperate to complete that soon...

skintchick

THat could be worth thinking about Doozergirl. I don;t want to be awkward but we have things organised on the weekends for the rest of the month and I am a bit concerned how we can get it all sorted. we don;t have family nearby who could help.

If only they'd mentioned this before! Then I'd have known what they were doing. I don;t understand why they haven;t just completed their sale and emigrated and left their solicitor to do the purchase of ours.

bitsandpieces

Until exchange, either you or the buyer can pull out for pretty much any reason. You need to agree a timescale that you can both live with.

If you will definitely sell your place to this buyer, can you offer to exchange ASAP with X weeks between exchange and completion? You can then get survey etc. done on the house you want to buy without time becoming such a big issue - if that falls through you could move into rented. Your buyer, though, will have the security of knowing that you can't (at all easily) get out of completing, so should feel comfortable leaving the country. If you offer to be helpful with allowing letting agents, potential viewers etc. into your house, the buyer shouldn't lose much cash, either.

It's possible, of course, that even that may be unsatisfactory to your buyer. It might also not be something you could tolerate. It does seem like a possible compromise, though.

skintchick

I think they're scared we will pull out as they are paying 30k less than it's worth, and two others in my street have sold for full asking in the last few weeks, but we have been looking for a house for ages and we aren;t going to pull out even though we'd make that 30k by reselling, because then we'd lose the house we want to buy.

PasturesNew

I decided once to move/sell ... I'd been away for a week, got back late Sunday night/Monday morning, had about 4 hours sleep, then picked up the phone on the Monday morning and asked the removals when they could put everything into storage and they said Wednesday, so I said "do it". It happened.

My last move, I wanted 2 weeks between exchange/completion, ended up with about 2-3 days' notice that I'd have two days. I was alone. It happened.

14 days is a long time, if you want it to happen.

There's a lot of fear ... but when it comes to the crunch, it just happens.

Richard_Webster

Our house sale/purchase has been pootering along OK, with us being the slowest link in the chain, not that we've been slow but everyone else is champing at the bit!

Do a bit more checking through your solicitor - I sometimes find that my client tells me "Everyone else wants an early completion..." and when we rush around like mad things to get an exchange and completion quickly some solicitors further up the chain say they are nowhere near ready...."Your clients said they wanted to move on the XXth..." "Well, they've not told me that and if they did I would have told them it isn't achievable..." (Major issues like not even having had draft contract papers on a related purchase!)

Unfortunately lay buyers and sellers agree dates without talking to their solicitors to check their feasibility - or agree a date weeks before without checking back that it is still feasible. It happens all the time.

So even if you do everything you can to accommodate your buyers there is no guarantee that the rest of the chain will be ready. Some estate agents are only too ready to believe chinese whispers from other estate agents which nobody has bothered to check with the solicitors involved.

pmlindyloo

I have to agree with Richard that there is an awful lot of 'chinese whispering' that goes on.

When selling our property we specified on every form that we needed 4 weeks after exchange before completion because we had to find somewhere to rent (couldn't sign rental contract before exchanging - a nightmare!) and we had a lodger that needed 4 weeks formal notice.

Nearing exchange we found our buyer had no idea we needed 4 weeks (?) and were pushing for 2 weeks. (school holidays and going on holiday).

It was major stress time. We had nowhere to live! With visions of living in the car we were ready to pull the plug and opt out.

Buyers' estate agent were phoning and saying if we don't exchange in 2 weeks buyers will pull out. (Threats or what?)

Fortunately our buyers were desperate for our house and our solicitors were chilled and said it was up to us when we moved.

It has all ended amicably - we compromised on 3 weeks and found a rented place the night before completion!

I think everyone gets very stressed out and begin to panic. Estate agents want their money.

I say, leave it to the solicitors to sort!

Evilm

Removals will pack everything for you. The difference in our quote was about £400 extra on an £1800 basic quote (we do have enough stuff for a family of six hence the price).