Hsbc

Emily1975

We have had an offer accepted on a house. However, we have been told we need to exchange within 28 days because the next person in the chain will be putting a deposit down on a development which she will lose if it takes longer than this (?).

Anyway...we applied for an HSBC mortgage today. We've been told we will get a decision in 5-7 days and then in 4-6 weeks it will all be finalised.

My question is, does this mean that we are cutting it fine, or for exchange does there only need to be a guarantee of mortgage finance available (not the money itself)?

luckyfool

You need the full mortgage offer to be in place to exchange. Its not clear from your post if HSBC are suggesting this will be the 4-6 weeks or not. Anecdotally HSBC may be a little slow so you might be cutting it fine.

josievg

You also need to ask your solicitor if they think 28 days is a feasible timescale to be ready to exchange and to confirm that they can work to that date on your behalf.

They will need to have completed the searches and all the other necessary enquiries in time too.

The 'paperwork' most often takes longer than this although in straightforward cases it can be done pretty swiftly (never experienced this personally!).