Using searches by previous potential buyers

foolishqueen

Evening All,

I went to view a house last week and put an offer in this Monday. Still waiting for the vendor to get back to the EA - they have left messages but nothing yet!

Anyway, when I was viewing the vendor siad her previous buyers were just about to exhange whem they pulled out for personal reasons. She did say however that all th esearches had already been done, which would save time for any new buyers.

Is this right? If the searches ahve been done, and our offer was accepted could our solicitr get hold of them? i.e. buy them from previous buyers solictors?

Sorry, FTB here so no real idea!

Thanks.

_Andy_

Hi FQ

I'd be a bit sus about these 'personal reasons' - a couple of years back I was in the same situation. It turned out the 'personal reasons' were they'd seen the Homebuyers report and realised what a state the house was in, as did we when we had the report done.
I'd be thinking, why did they get to that stage and then pull out?
Sorry, can't answer your actual query though!

foolishqueen

Hi Andy,

I know what you mean. I think she said the couple ended up separating hence pullimng out. She seemed genuine enough but you never know.

The other thing that annoys the hell out of me is that she is still going for the house she wanted when she thought her house had sold first time, but they won't wait much past Christmas so she said she was eager to to sell.

So I put my offer in om Monday - EA says she is away till Wednesday. Ring EA Wednesday only to be told the person deaing with the sale is not in till Thursday. Rung again Thursay - still nothing, not been able to gethold of her. Ring today - again nothing - EA written a letter, but still diddly squat.

I know her job can take her away, but come on, surely she would leave a mobile or someone else to act on her half is she was serious about selling. We could have been getting surveys done for next week if she had accepted on Monday.

What makes it worse is that the EA told me there wer a couple of other offers in, so now I have to wait all weekend wondering if I have got it or not!!

Opps, sorry for the rant there. Feel better now though!!

Cheers.

roastduck

Don't always listen to the EA .... in fact trust noone apart from your gut feeling. of course the EA is going to tell you that there are someone else in the competition ... whether it's the truth of not, it doesn't matter, what matters is you phone the EA back on Monday and tell them that you are keen to buy the house and this is the final offer you are prepare to pay. If the seller is still in a keen position to sell, then ask them to call you this afternoon and phone down!

don't let anyone messes you around. we had been gazumped many times and we've learnt our lessons very quickly. know what we want and don't that the EA / the vendor to waste your time. Vendor doesn't always get every feedback / offers from the EA ... the EA ALWAYS tries to rise the price as high as possible to earn the extra commission! .... have a good weekend coz you can't change anything ... don't waste quality time worrying sick about something that you may / may not get! it's not worth it! if it's yours, it will be yours! honestly!

foolishqueen

Thanks for the comments roastduck. I'm not known for my patience but what can you do! I'm half tempted to pay her a visit and see if she is in and what she thinks of my offer?!

silvercar

searches are usually useable for 3-4 months. Your solicitor would arrange for the purchase off them from the previous buyers solicitor. the going rate is half their original cost.

buying searches is fine. buying a survey is risky as you have no comeback if the surveyor missed something, as the survey was not done for your benefit.

foolishqueen

Hi silvercar,

That is what I wanted to hear, I don't think I would buy a survey from the previous buyer. If vendor ever gets back to her EA about my offer,I was thinking of using Conveyancing Warehouse (good price and seemingly good reviews on here) - the buying of the previous searches - is that somehting they would happliy be able to do to save time?

Thanks.

Bossyboots

Agree with silvercar, the buying of searches is quite usual practice and the original buyers will be only too pleased to get even a small sum back on their lost costs. There should be no quibble from your conveyancers to obtain this search and if there is then maybe you ought to consider whether they are the right firm to be using.

Jorgan_2

You may went to check that your mortgage lender will want to accept these searches. Some lenders don't accept personal searches, if the previous buyer did personal searches you may end up paying twice for the same thing.

benood

Watch out for the EA on this one - the vendor may be telling the truth but as likely is that previous buyers pulled out on survey (interesting you've not been offered that just searches) and you are going to be rushed into a purchase through pressure from seller to do the deal so she can move (ie if you don't hit her deadline that's it) and under the threat of "other interested parties" who may or may not exist.

My advice is proceed with caution.

But buying other peoples searches is common - we did it earlier this year (the place we bought had frightened off a couple who offered the full asking price - everything is clapped out from the roof to the central heating )

foolishqueen

Thanks for the advice everyone. I know I have to be careful about letting my heart rule my head on this one.

My lener is NR - does anyone know if they acceot personal searches? I have no idea if the existing ons are of this type or not.

Thanks again.