Two Solicitors giving different Advice - who is right?

beachbeth · 13 August 2007 at 3:43PM

The seller of the house that we are buying has been messing about and, although we were hoping to have moved in by the end of July, we still haven't moved. Because we don't want to lose our own buyer we have told our solicitor that we will exchange on our property and I asked if we could leave the completion date open as it should only be a matter of 2 weeks now. Our solicitor told us this wasn't possible as the completion date needs to be written into the exchange documents. So we told her we would go ahead with our sale as we could move in with my parents whilst we wait to complete on our new house.

However, our estate agent told our buyer's solicitor what we wanted to do and she says that we can leave the completion date open!!! She also told them that we wouldn't be able to sell ours before buying our new one for some reason. It makes me wonder if she was a bit confused about whether we were talking about our sellers or buyers?

Who is right?

Richard_Webster · 13 August 2007 at 4:02PM

The date for completion has to be put in the contract unless you have a formula with a floating date. You could, for instance, exchange with completion to be two week after your solicitor gives notice to the buyer's solicitor with a "back stop" date a few months ahead by which time you would have to move out whatever happens.

Your solicitor serves the notice on your buyer's solicitor when exchange takes place on your related purchase so that the two transactions complete together.

The problem with this idea is that your buyer may not be prepared to wait.

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

beachbeth · 13 August 2007 at 5:52PM

So it is best to sell ours and move out and then we are free to move on as soon as our seller is ready. (Its not ideal to move in with my parents as I have two teenagers and load of dogs but they have got a really big house!!! Plus it'll be very moneysaving for us for a while because we won't have our bills to pay - just chip in a bit with theirs whilst earning interest from the sale of our old house!:p )