Getting really cross now

helping_hubby

Well that's some better news at least. Fingers crossed they call you back. Keep us posted.

Donnaalana

Fingers crossed. Know what you mean about the EA - ours is getting right up my nose. Nobody ever answers her line you always have to leave a message and even then she doesn't get back to you. The sale has even been transferred out of the branch to this lady - our very own personal sales advisor but she doesn't care. Like our sol said if it wasn't for us (FTBs at the bottom of the chain) it wouldn't be moving at all yet it seems as though she is pandering to the lady at the top. I kindly told my sol today that i would let her liase with the EA to hopefully get some results.

Richard_Webster

When Home Information Packs come in all these problems will be sorted out and everything will happen much more quickly...

Durhhhh!!!

Well, that's what the government would like you to think!

They and people like the Consumer's Assn never really understood that the main reason for the frustration at the length of time everything takes is the chain and the difficulty of getting info about what is going on. Needless to say the HIP will do zilch to cure this!

The frustrations aired in this thread are so common. It will be good if the info can get through, but equally I always try to explain to people that it is very difficult - everyone wants to know what others are doing but don't want to tell them what they are doing! Information gained is often inaccurate or out of date.

Agents can be sloppy - they ring up the individuals they are dealing with and ask things like "Can you move on the 29th?" and get an answer like "Yeah, that would be great." Agent assumes that person definitely can move on that date, but didn't ask the person whether his solr says he can move on 29th! Solr, when asked a week or two later, says its virtually impossible because he hasn't even got draft contract papers from the solrs above him!

Meanwhile everyone else in the chain has booked holidays, ordered carpets, taken time off work, all on the basis of the person's innocent answer to the agent's badly phrased question.

The agent should have said something like "Good, you want to move on the 29th, do you know if your solr will be ready?"
Client: "He said we could probably move at the end of the month..."
Agent: "When did he say that?"
Client: "When we first asked him to act for us, a month ago."
Agent:"Have you checked with him since, whether it is still possible?" Client: "No, should I?"
It is because this sort of careless questioning that things go wrong.

Sometimes it isn't the agents (who should know better) but the individuals in the chain themselves who simply don't probe enough. This is more understandable as most people don't move that often and the pitfalls will not be so onbvious so it is easy for them to rely upon information given usually quitre innocently by others who also don't appreciate the significance of what they are saying.

As a conveyancing solicitor I believe the information given in the post to be useful but I accept no liability except to fee-paying clients

olive84

Estate agent who vaguely resembled a human being called me back yesterday afternoon (Yey)! She said that they had been calling the top of the chain every other day, and were waiting to hear back from them. The reason she hadn't called me is because they didn't have any news. Fair enough, I said, but in future can you call me once a week, even if there isn't any news. I said it wasn't fair to ignore me for a month. She said that she was sorry, and she'll try and let me know what's happening, even if it's nothing.

Obviously I'm not prepared to wait forever not knowing what's going on, but at some point I figure something has to happen. Either it collapses or the top of the chain decides they're ready. So I've done my stressing for the week, and have got somewhere at last!

Will keep you guys updated with any more news, and make sure you let me know how yours is going!

helping_hubby

Well at least you've had some form of feedback.

So what exactly is going on with your chain?

I've been told by our estate agent that the person at the top of our chain is still waiting for the mortgage valuation to take place and that there is a backlog. Our mortgage offer took about 3 weeks I think from applying to getting a formal written offer.

I would expect the people at the top to get theirs any day now, as it must be a couple of weeks already since they applied for the mortgage.

It seems unlikely that we'll exchange on Friday so now we have to hope that the repossession people will extend their dates.

olive84

In our chain there are 4 properties.

We are FTB, and we're ready.

The top of the chain, last thing I heard which was about 3 weeks ago, was having his survey done, and was due to have his searches back that week.

Then the people buying his house said 3 weeks ago that they wanted to exchange in 2 weeks, and the top of the chain said that if he couldn't do that he would break the chain. That obviously didn't happen and was a load of empty threats and promises.

We thought our vendor was ready, but it turns out that they are still waiting for some answers to some queries. My theory is that because the top isn't ready he's told his sol to go on a go slow so people don't get annoyed. Our vendors sol just wasn't clever enough to do that to us!

So really it is the top of the chain that isn't ready, but I don't know exactly what stage he is at in the conveyancing process. Assume he has had his searches back and his survey done, but not sure about any additional stuff or his mortgage offer. This is the info I'm trying to get out of the EA.

In your case, my sol said to me that when people give him deadlines, like the one on the repo house, he and most sol tend to ignore them, as it takes as long as it takes. Not sure if that is what's happening with the top of your chain? I have no idea how much notice you get before you're going to exchange, so don't know if its poss for you to exchange on Fri? Your chain sounds really stressful.

olive84

Update- my sol just called and said he has received a letter from our vendor's sol saying they are ready to exchange and asking about completion dates! I'm not sure whether this means we are in the clear yet, and I really don't want to get my hopes up, but it sounds like good news?

One thing I'm confused about- does this mean the whole chain is ready? I assume that our vendor wouldn't be ready to exchange with us unless their vendor was ready. Is this right or am I just getting my hopes up?

olive84

My EA just called and demanded to know why I thought we were ready to exchange. I said my sol had received a letter saying that we were. He said that it was a standard letter the vendor's sol would have sent out to either side of them to let people know they were ready. As you can see from my previous post I had pretty much figured that out for myself, so that didn't come as a surprise.

But what on earth possessed him to have a complete mental breakdown at me I will never know. He said that he hadn't been able to contact either the top of the chain's sol or EA, but he was sure that they were 'nowhere near ready' and they were holding off till July. He then said they were only 2 weeks into their purchase. No, I said, they started their purchase on a freehold on 23rd March, so if they weren't ready to exchange pretty quick the rest of the chain was going to start getting pretty annoyed, considering all of us were ready. I said I didn't care whether he wanted to complete in October 2009, he should be ready to exchange and go into rented if necessary, and that was between him and his buyer.

I told him that there was no way the chain would hold together if this man wasn't ready to exchange soon. He seemed intent on making me feel stupid to be honest. I wonder if its because I had some info that he didn't have. It felt a bit like he was trying to make a point along the lines of, 'don't think you and your sol know more than me, because even though I am openly admitting I haven't been able to get access to the top of the chain, I am an EA which means I am right and you are wrong'. Now, to do that, instead of just let me liaise with my sol, who may well turn around next week and say the top of the chain isn't ready, seems completely ridiculous to me.

So I enjoyed appx 1 1/2 hours feeling like everything was going well, and now I feel c**p again. Rant over, thanks guys. :A

Donnaalana

What a not very nice man! I would probably get on to my sol if i were you and get them to get very snotty with the ea after all they should be acting in your best interests.
Hot my fingers crossed for you - am guessing he's not been to charm school then.

olive84

Well, it turns out that my stupid EA was wrong and we are ready to exchange :j . Apparantly today is the day. So what happens today? I know it's all done on the phone, but what time should I expect a call? We are FTB so do we exchange first? Really hope nothing goes wrong now...