Leafleting to buy a house? UPDATED: SUCCESS!!!

azkaban420

Hi all, I've been a bit quiet so that I wouldn't jinx it but I've actually successfully found a house through leafleting and have exchanged today!! Here's what happened:

Diary of a leafleter:

Day 1: Saturday 12 Feb Midday – Leaflet 100 houses in local area to see if I can find a seller directly

12 Feb: 5pm: Receive email from someone interested in selling. Viewing set for next day 12pm

13 Feb: 12pm view house, fall in love with it

13 Feb: 7pm return to house for second viewing, sit and have chat, offer £10k below asking price, and get accepted!!

14 Feb: Solicitor informed and paid to start searches; Mortgage Broker informed, valuation fee paid with few to arranging surveys over next few days.

15 Feb: Solicitor’s initial papers arrive in post; Signed, returned

16 Feb: Go see seller again before they depart abroad for ten days; Their solicitor has been given everything. They’d like exchange beg Mar, completion mid April.

22 Feb: Receive pre-contract papers (signed and returned), and Property Information Questionnaire/Fixtures and Fittings List/Contract Agreement from seller’s solicitor

02 Mar: Valuation & survey carried out, nothing major to report

09 Mar: Receive Mortgage offer today and we also EXCHANGED today! Completion is set for 15 Apr (5 weeks away) to give time to sellers to arrange move abroad.

All in all the process from Day 1 will have taken 9 weeks, and that’s only because we lost 10 days whilst sellers were abroad and a mutual agreement of a 5 week delay between exchange and completion or it would have been sooner.

Still not completely jumping for joy until we have the keys in hand, but do feel that sometimes dreams can come true, so will use a jumpy smiley :j

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the thread and especially those who encouraged me to go ahead and leaflet - it certainly worked for me....and of course please wish me luck that we successfully complete (can't count on anything these days)!

Good luck to everyone else trying to find/achieve their dreams of buying and selling - it will happen!

A very tired but happy and relieved Az!

15 Apr Updated: COMPLETED..whooot!

CloudCuckooLand

Well done!

The forum shows there are plenty of people on the market not prepared to sell.

While your thread demonstrates that people not on the market are prepared to sell.

What a funny old world.

azkaban420

Thanks, it also proves to me that unless you try you'll never know. To think my DH almost didn't post through the letterbox of this house we're buying as he thought there was no chance they'd be interested in selling as it looked too nice!

Az

hazyjo

Aww that's excellent news I love a happy story! Makes a change lol!

Really pleased for you. Hope you'll be very happy in your new home

Jx

silvercar

Really glad it worked for you.

Actually quite surprised that people thinking of moving abroad didn't market the house themselves.

The_Drama_Llama

Oooh...I'm very tempted to give it a go myself now.

BornAtTheRightTime

Congrats Az, you deserve it!

botchjob

that is AMAZING. Well done! Give yourself a big pat on the back.

WelshNic

That's brilliant Az, just goes to show if you don't ask you don't get

Your leg work certainly paid off :beer:

ankspon

I had a 3 storey town house and due to being ill i couldn't manage steps.We liked the area so leafleted to P/X for a ground floor flat,moved within 6 weeks,a real success