What takes the most time when buying a house?

papermoney

As per title really.

Is it the searches?
The mortgage agreement?
the solicitors checking contracts?

Why does it take so long? Been told it's 6-8 weeks ish...

Tiger_greeneyes

papermoney wrote:

As per title really.

Is it the searches?
The mortgage agreement?
the solicitors checking contracts?

Why does it take so long? Been told it's 6-8 weeks ish...

This isn't an easy question to answer - in fact it's impossible!

The searches are done by the Local Authority - each LA takes different times to do the searches and report back - it depends on their workloads at the time. Could be days or weeks.

The mortgage agreement (it's actually a mortgage offer, so that you aren't confused by it's title) - again it depends on factors like: 1. how long the survey takes to reach the lender. That depends on which survey you have and how long it takes your lender to instruct the survey in the first place and 2. how busy the mortgage centre is at the time - sometimes it's days, other times it could be weeks.

Solicitors checking contracts - no two conveyances are ever the same. There are so many factors to take into account here, depending on how straightforward your purchase is. For instance, a leasehold property would generally take longer than a freehold property due to the extra paperwork involved with the lease. Also, they have to rely on other solicitors in the chain - who in turn rely on buyers and sellers and estate agents...

The rule of thumb is a couple of months but always expect the unexpected. My shortest purchase was six weeks - my longest was over three months.

You only know for sure when you're going to complete when everyone is ready to exchange contracts. Unless you're in Scotland, whereby you exchange contracts shortly after your offer is accepted - you know pretty much from the outset when completion will take place.

Not the answers you were looking for but at least you know more about what will be happening behind the scenes now

Wickedkitten

We would have been done in 4 weeks from the offer being accepted to getting the keys if it wasn't for the mortgage adviser who kept messing up. First she processed our credit card wrong for the survey so they didn't end up getting paid in time and we had to wait an extra week for that to get done, then she messed up twice with the figures on our amended mortgage thing after we renegotiated after getting the survey back.

nelly_2

Shifting the bed I'd have said

Tiger_greeneyes

nelly wrote:

Shifting the bed I'd have said

Eww, yeah, just think of the fluff

EdInvestor

I blame the solicitors.Searches are often now available online and a surveyor can usually put in a report within a couple of weeks, with mortgage offer pretty soon after.

It's outrageous that the solicitors are still taking 2 months to put all this together , no improvement in 30 years. Pathetic.

papermoney

Thanks - I wasn't sure what to expect.

Our buyers are ready to move and just need a date, whereas we took longer to find a property and won't know about the mortgage until Monday.

Tiger_greeneyes

It sounds like you're getting there. Once you've had the offer of mortgage it's just down to the solicitors to do their bit. If you're not in a long chain it shouldn't be too long before you're ready to exchange contracts Generally speaking, the longer the chain, the more time you spend waiting around for things to happen.

It's probably a good idea to start thinking about moving dates and get a couple of removals companies around to give you some quotes (if you're using them that is).

As soon as you've got a date for exchange and completion from your solicitor, call your removals company and check they're available for the completion date - and book them there and then - before someone else does! Once that's done you can revert to your solicitor and exchange contracts. The whole solicitor/removals company/solicitor process should only take you ten minutes but it's the best way of doing it or you could find yourself without a removals company. I've only been let down once by a removals firm but they put it right in the end