Offer accepted-what's the order now?

londonlydia

Hi,

We have had our offer accepted on the property. What do we do now? We already have a mortgage agreement in principle. I've had a look online, and there seems to be some conflicting advice/ info, so now I'm confused....I think I understand the later stages like completion slightly better, it's just the first phase im getting in a pickle about! I'm more needing to focus on all the different things I need to arrange, rather than the individual sections I do with the solicitire

So, I think we need to something along the lines of:

-Get our solicitor to start the ball rolling with theirs (conveyancing). We've got 3 to choose from, but not actually chosen one yet.
-Surveys **here I'm totally confused. Do we arrange this through our solicitor, our mortgage provider, or do ourselves? If we arrange for a homebuyers report ourselves, could the mortgage lenders use this?
-Get a firm mortgage offer
-other solicitor things, exchange & completion

So, is that about right, or have I got my order wrong?

GrowingUp

yup, your right,

make sure its taken off the market as your shelling out a fair bit on surveys

renegadesofjunk

I'm about to complete on my house purchase and also found it all a bit confusing, lots of conflicting advice etc. So here is what I did, if it helps:

1. As soon as the offer was accepted I was told I needed to provide solicitor details REALLY QUICKLY. This was easy for me as my mortgage is through HSBC, and I wanted to use someone on their panel otherwise I would have incurred a cost, so I just got referred and that was that. I think this was the day after my offer was accepted.
2. THEN I made an appointment with the bank to get my mortgage finalised, I recommend getting this done as early as possible in case anything goes wrong, I waited about 10 days to hear back but some people wait longer, or their application is declined and then it's back to the drawing board. I'm a worrier and wanted to make sure I was prepared for things to go wrong.
3. RE: surveys. The bank will arrange a valuation survey, as the mortgage will be subject to the survey being satisfactory. If you want a more thorough survey you can arrange it yourself. I didn't bother but when I move in I'm going to ask a builder to look round and tell me if anything needs doing.
4. Then there was lots of paperwork and waiting for other paperwork.
5. I am completing and exchanging on the same day, some people think this is a bad idea, some don't. I'm in a bit of a hurry so that's what I've decided to do but if not I think it's normal to leave aroound a week between exchange and completion.

A lot of the stuff is guided by your solicitor anyway, the most important things initially are getting a solicitor sorted and the mortgage agreed. I think anyway.

jetblack61

We're a little further down the line than you, but not by much so this is how we did it...

- Offer in and accepted (already had mortgage agreed in principle)
- Arranged to see mortgage advisor ASAP to get the full application going. They were doing the valuation survey anyway, and so we asked them to do a homebuyers report whilst they were at it - £240. Survey was done on the following Tues (instructed the previous Thurs)
- Notified solicitor the process was starting, once the survey report was back and 'ok' we sent a copy to the solicitor along with their money on account/personal ID/ address confirmation etc so they could get started with searches etc.
- Now we're in the process of waiting for our solicitor to talk to their solicitor and get answers to various queries and bits and pieces. Then we'll be ready to exchange contracts, and finally complete the sale!

Good luck with yours

savageHK

We've just bought our first house.
I would get the mortgage offer firmed up first, before starting any other balls rolling. We had a solicitor from the mortgage provider as free legal fees were included (ps, this still means you end up shelling out a whole lot of cash for surveys!). Then instruct a solicitor and get the survey done. The survey that your mortgage provider needs is different to the one you need and they won't accept yours. We did the same as jetblack and got the same surveyor to do our survey as it was a bit cheaper since he was doing the other report for the mortgage company in any case. Then it's just chasing up solicitors repeatedly!