Vendor won't exchange, advice

lincroft1710

You have really only 2 options:

1) Rent locally to preferred new school

2) Hope that the vendor is willing or you can persuade them to exchange within the next 56 days.

TheCyclingProgrammer

lincroft1710 wrote: »

You have really only 2 options:

1) Rent locally to preferred new school

2) Hope that the vendor is willing or you can persuade them to exchange within the next 56 days.

Or 3) accept whatever school place we can get and get on as many waiting lists as possible.

I keep trying to think longer term and while everyone wants the best possible school for their child, I do think our daughter has the potential to do well anywhere with help from us. Bad schools can improve, we could always look at switching her to Juniors (our first choice is an infant/junior split school) and we would be in the right place for good secondary schools. And we would have the home we want.

Errata

The basic problem is that you were cutting it fine expecting everything to be done and dusted in four months, when the average from start to finish is three months.

TheCyclingProgrammer

Errata wrote: »

The basic problem is that you were cutting it fine expecting everything to be done and dusted in four months, when the average from start to finish is three months.

Not much we could do about that. We started looking in April!

Anyway, my wife and I have talked and have pretty much tossed out the ultimatum idea.

We haven't ruled out the possibility of renting. We would need a 6 month break clause and need to be prepared for the possibility of overlapping rent/mortgage payments depending on when we complete and also the possibility of the whole thing falling through entirely.

If we rented and it all fell through, well we'd still have a home and we'd get our daughter into the school we want. And we'd be in the area and can start looking again for houses.

The advantage of staying put is we pay below market rate rent and can pretty much leave whenever we want to.

[Deleted User]

To be honest, even one year in a bad school is not going to affect her as much as you feel. As long as there's a good anti bulling policy.., they are usually very closely supervised at that age.

Hopefully you aren't worried about her academic progress at 3?

pinkteapot

I'd go for renting in the area if you get to crunch-time, even though it'll cost you a bit more than you're paying now. You never know - by living there you may find pros/cons to the area or new areas you don't know yet that mean you consider houses you wouldn't have before?

You can tell letting agents you want an initial 6 month tenancy. Not all insist on 12 months. Also look for one where the landlord is happy to have an initial 6 month AST, then just let it roll onto a periodic tenancy rather than have you sign up for another six months. Then, after six months, you can always leave on a month's notice.

Do agree with the poster above about school quality at reception age though. Guess it's just weighing up the importance of your preferred school vs the hassle and cost of moving an extra time...

Voyager2002

rosie383 wrote: »

we would prefer to lose our current buyer rather than throwing away six months in rent

For most people, there would also be six months without mortgage payments so the finances are less clear-cut. Of course, renting and then buying later would involve an extra set of removal costs and general disruption... a good offer would justify that, but not an average one.

pinkteapot

Voyager2002 wrote: »

For most people, there would also be six months without mortgage payments so the finances are less clear-cut. Of course, renting and then buying later would involve an extra set of removal costs and general disruption... a good offer would justify that, but not an average one.

Agreed. We sold at £250k before the changes to stamp duty. We marketed at £280k (of course!) and if someone had fallen in love and offered us £265-270k, we would have cleared out and rented if they'd wanted. At £250k, we had buyers coming out of our ears so we made our buyers wait while we looked. There was no incentive for us to rent as they were easily replaceable.

Voyager2002

pinkteapot wrote: »

Do agree with the poster above about school quality at reception age though. Guess it's just weighing up the importance of your preferred school vs the hassle and cost of moving an extra time...

I disagree with this... Primary School lays the foundations for everything else, and getting a really good primary school is worth a fair amount of trouble. Having said that, most primary schools are better than people realise... (there is a general belief that schools are bad while most primary parents know that their particular school is good: they therefore believe that they have an unusually good one).

JencParker

TheCyclingProgrammer wrote: »

Our daughter is 3 and starts reception next September.

pinkteapot- lots of good schools within a mile but most are probably oversubscribed. So we will be left with the school nobody wants.

Our only positive thing is our first choice school has 60 places and we know that on average, only half of those are filled from within the priority admission area as it's quite small. So anyone who lives near the school will get a place if they want it.

What that should mean is if and when we move in, we should be right near the top of the waiting list, if not the very top. The school is only round the corner. So we would stand a chance if a few places come up. I've spoken to the school and they said last year they had no waiting list movement but they have in the years before.

School places are at a premium in London and Home Counties so if this is the area you are looking to move too I wouldn't put too much store on being on a waiting list. I think you have to decide what it is important - getting your daughter into a good school, or the possibility of getting her into one where you are now and travelling back to that school until or if a place comes up at the new school if you move.