The NEW waiting to exchange thread...

Windofchange

God it's a stressful process hey!? I check back here every now and again after our purchase last summer - we didn't have your issue, but our conveyancer went on holiday three days before the vendor agreed to exchange contracts and set a completion date. He hadn't fully actioned everything on our end due to a small mistake, and we couldn't get hold of him for 10 days - his colleague covering for him couldn't answer the question as he hadn't documented his reasoning. So, we had a 10 day wait thinking our vendor was going to pull the sale because the person above her was pushing for a completion date and was getting upset we couldn't provide one.

It all went through in the end, but it was 10 days of no sleep and stressing about the what ifs. To have got to where you have got to there is presumably quite a lot of money tied in from both ends in terms of searches, solicitors fees etc, so I would say to you that it is highly unlikely that something will go wrong now. It could of course, but if someone was going to pull out or do something underhand, it would have most likely happened by now. All you can do is sit and wait as you know, but it doesn't make it easier.

When we finally got the keys to our new house, I walked in and said to my other half I don't want to buy another house in a long long long time. It caused so many little arguments between us, so many sleepless nights stressing about things that were in retrospect outside of our control. Hang in there. 

FTB_Help

naomibm said:

our buyers mortgage valuation person is coming next week...how long after that should they get their mortgage offer? any ideas?!

My mortgage offer came in the same day straight after the valuation, but i have seen lots on this forum that have waited a while before it comes through.

Your buyer maybe waiting for sign off from the underwritters so that may delay things too

Natbag

Becksina said:

So we are due to move tomorrow. Removals are booked, house is fully packed, we don’t have a THING to use. And my solicitor just responded to a mortgage question with ‘If we complete on the 1st’ so cue me thinking the solicitor isn’t confident the money will arrive in time tomorrow. If it all falls through tomorrow I’ll be pulling, I can’t go through the stress of these last few days again. Simultaneous exchange and completion is one of the worst decisions we’ve had to make. Preparing myself to be sat in a packed van tomorrow crying when I get told it’s not gone through 

Oh, nightmare! I've exchanged and completed on the same day before and all went smoothly, thankfully, but knowing what I know now from this forum the thought of doing so again fills me with dread! Maybe call them for an update/reassurance. Hope it all goes ok, will keep my fingers crossed for you.

3or4magpies

Becksina said:

Random question and not sure if anyone will know.
We are due to move on the 1st, now my mortgage direct debit comes out on the 1st, but the mortgage will also be getting paid off on that date - so am I going to be looking at paying both the old and new mortgage in one month? I'm dreading this as we won't be able to afford 2 mortgage payments! 

This has happened to us, I rang Nationwide ahead of completion and they advised not to cancel the DD and that it'd be refunded in about 10 days. Had to bite the bullet and just pay both (although the new mortgage first payment's taken 7th April so might coincide with the old mortgage refund.
Good luck!!

daniel_owen_uk

Sad day, after over a year searching and finding "The One", we have just pulled out of the purchase
Searches showed a mine shaft in the back garden (untreated), and with us wanting to extend that way we made the decision it wasn't worth the risk.  That and the potential risk to any future sales.
Gutted is not the word.

Natbag

daniel_owen_uk said:

Sad day, after over a year searching and finding "The One", we have just pulled out of the purchase
Searches showed a mine shaft in the back garden (untreated), and with us wanting to extend that way we made the decision it wasn't worth the risk.  That and the potential risk to any future sales.
Gutted is not the word.

Oh no, but you're right, that is a deal breaker. Hope you find something you love even more that's perfect for you - keep us posted.

Caz_Mnaz

daniel_owen_uk said:

Sad day, after over a year searching and finding "The One", we have just pulled out of the purchase
Searches showed a mine shaft in the back garden (untreated), and with us wanting to extend that way we made the decision it wasn't worth the risk.  That and the potential risk to any future sales.
Gutted is not the word.

Oh no! But agree, you don't want your lovely extension disappearing into the ground!! Mine is on an old coal field but the entire area is and thankfully no shaft close by so I'm thinking if all the other houses are still standing with no subsidence claims I should be alright....IF I ever actually get to buy it of course....   

bigkenny1975

Sorry to the conveyancers on here but this is another conveyancer bashing post. I emailed mine on Tuesday asking them to send on some details they had promised me a couple of weeks earlier. No reply. Not really a shock as they have never replied to any emails I have sent - even though they state that this is their preferred method of communication due to covid. I then called on Thursday to chase it up, the receptionist put me through to the conveyancer's voicemail. I left a message asking for a call back. Again no reply, they state that they aim to respond to all emails and calls by the end of the working day. Finally on Friday afternoon I was passed through when I called. 

The conveyancer said that they could see my stuff was in the typing pool (do they still exist) but she would send it on by the end of the day - to be fair she did. I asked if my searches were back and she said not all of them but they had put some queries over to the seller's solicitor on what they had back. 

Yesterday I got a call from the EA, I had emailed asking how the other two sales in the chain were going. Apparently our seller has all their searches back and their queries answered, but their solicitor has not had any queries from mine! Not what I was told. (She is not sure on the final sale but knows they are at a similar stage). The EA also said that she would be surprised if the searches were not all back by now. She went on to say that the conveyancer we are using has been removed from their list of recommended conveyancers as they  are not responsive - I did point out that we were using them because they recommended them (that is not strictly true as someone we know had a good experience with them a couple of years ago, we got a discount by letting the EA recommend them though). 

I guess we are coming near to exchange but I cannot help but feel it will be our solicitor who is holding everything up by being unresponsive and disingenuous. I am sure that there are some great conveyancers out there, but if you read these forums it seems you will be hard pressed to find them. 

FTB_Help

bigkenny1975 said:

Sorry to the conveyancers on here but this is another conveyancer bashing post. I emailed mine on Tuesday asking them to send on some details they had promised me a couple of weeks earlier. No reply. Not really a shock as they have never replied to any emails I have sent - even though they state that this is their preferred method of communication due to covid. I then called on Thursday to chase it up, the receptionist put me through to the conveyancer's voicemail. I left a message asking for a call back. Again no reply, they state that they aim to respond to all emails and calls by the end of the working day. Finally on Friday afternoon I was passed through when I called. 

The conveyancer said that they could see my stuff was in the typing pool (do they still exist) but she would send it on by the end of the day - to be fair she did. I asked if my searches were back and she said not all of them but they had put some queries over to the seller's solicitor on what they had back. 

Yesterday I got a call from the EA, I had emailed asking how the other two sales in the chain were going. Apparently our seller has all their searches back and their queries answered, but their solicitor has not had any queries from mine! Not what I was told. (She is not sure on the final sale but knows they are at a similar stage). The EA also said that she would be surprised if the searches were not all back by now. She went on to say that the conveyancer we are using has been removed from their list of recommended conveyancers as they  are not responsive - I did point out that we were using them because they recommended them (that is not strictly true as someone we know had a good experience with them a couple of years ago, we got a discount by letting the EA recommend them though). 

I guess we are coming near to exchange but I cannot help but feel it will be our solicitor who is holding everything up by being unresponsive and disingenuous. I am sure that there are some great conveyancers out there, but if you read these forums it seems you will be hard pressed to find them. 

A general consensus is to never use EA recommended conveyancer, they are often very hit or miss (mainly more on the miss side!).

The EA gets a massive kick back for recommendations so to make a profit these conveyancer will just pile it high and it often shows in their service.

You're almost over the line, don't worry hopefully this will be all old news for you soon

Natbag

@bigkenny1975 - in exactly the same boat here, in fact, I could have typed that myself. Getting told very little by the EA, and just that they're still waiting on stuff, and given the absolute radio silence from my solicitor (who is dealing with 3 of the 6 parties in this chain), I'm pretty sure that's where the bottleneck lies. Sigh.