The NEW waiting to exchange thread...

JohnTheSkier

So, I exchanged on Friday (04/11) and will complete on 25th November. Timeline as follows:

16/05 - Property viewed

17/05 - Offer submitted and accepted

31/05 - Solicitor instructed

10/06 - Full Mortgage application submitted

15/06 - Memoradnum of sale received

01/09 - Mortgage offer received (after a fair bit of back and forth with Nationwide and chasing seller for details)

15/10 - Report received (seller's solicitor had gone silent for a while)

04/11 - Exchanged

25/11 - Completion!

Took a while, but got there. Glad my rate has been locked in since the application was submitted in June.

RM_2013

Great news @JohnTheSkier

RM_2013

julicorn said:

We're attempting to exchange on our sale towards the end of this week, only completing just before Christmas though. 

In the meantime, we're waiting for the conveyancing on our new purchase to catch up. It would be great if we could complete on the same day as we're moving out of our current home, but will see (current plan B is to annoy friends and family for a few weeks over Christmas and then airbnb, with our belongings in storage). 

Good luck with everything and fingers crossed you can co ordinate the sale and purchase for less hassle for you 

EndlessStruggle

Urgh. I'm moving really slowly and feeling a tad nervous now.

I had covid a month ago and I haven't bounced back at all.

I've got serious fatigue and getting better so much slower than I wanted.

I've got a lot boxed up ready for storage but I can only manage a few hours out of bed and a small shop/drive. 

Buyers have had their survey and there's just a few small enquiries left.

Their survey was awful, they paid £900-1000 to a big firm for a L3 survey and he was here an hour banged about, run taps and took photos. He then laughed that they had wasted their money as it only needed a L2 survey. 

On the purchase, I've got to print, ask my neighbour to witness my documents tomorrow and send them off. My survey is a week tomorrow and then we're just waiting for probate. 

Got my mortgage port approved. Family and friends are all ecstatic about me moving local again, which is only thing holding my stress/anxiety at bay.

RM_2013

1616six said:

Another day with no updates 😂

Emailed the agent, got an out of office reply

Wont pester the solicitor just yet as only heard from her on Thursday to say she’d had a response to enquiries but not all were answered so she’s gone back to the sellers solicitor to chase. Will email her on Wednesday if I don’t hear. 

I’m only stressing because our mortgage offer expiry means we really need to complete before Xmas. If we can just get confirmation that we can exchange by the end of Nov and complete first couple of weeks of Dec Il be more than happy. 

If we exchange by the end of Nov, il save £700 rent by giving our 1 month notice in Nov rather than Dec… so I’m hoping they’ll get it done!

Good luck to the rest in similar boats…

I think we are still on a similar timescale!! I last spoke to solicitors on Friday.  Sale looked like all enquiries were completed but awaiting confirmation that buyers solicitor satisfied and on the sale they confirmed that they’d had some enquiries back but needed to chase those still outstanding.  I was going to chase Weds but not sure I can wait that long 🤣

Conquest19

Single Person First Time Buyer buying a Leasehold property
Age: 33

Deposit: £30,000
Help To Buy ISA Bonus: £3000
Lender cash back: £500
Property value: £275,000
Lender Mortgage: £245,000 (89% LTV) with £999 product fee paid up front
Lender Terms and Rate: 35 years, first 5 years fixed to 2.79%
Lender Mortgage Offer Duration: 6 Months(22nd April 2022 - 18th October 2022)
Lender Automatic Mortgage Offer Extension: 1 month(18th October 2022 - 15th November 2022)
Lender: TSB Bank PLC
Broker?: Nope, I used Experian(by accident) mortgage search which recommended me TSB, so applied direct.
Legal Fees and Misc: £3380 :-(

Mortgage in Principle: 5th April 2022
Property Listed: 6th April 2022
Property Viewed: 8th April 2022
Property Offer Accepted: 9th April 2022
Mortgage Application: 13th April 2022
Memorandum of Sale: 14th April 2022
Case Account Setup with Solicitor: 13th April 2022
Searches Requested: 13th April 2022
Mortgage Valuation: 20th April 2022
Mortgage Offered: 22nd April 2022
Empty Mortgage Deed form: 29th April 2022
Empty Contract, TR1 forms: 9 May 2022
Searches Completed: 20th May 2022
Signed Contract, TR1, Mortgage Deed forms sent to solicitor: 14th July 2022

Period of BILLIONS of outstanding enquiries back and fourth from solicitors and EA
Original Mortgage Offer Expires(automatic 1 month extension kicks in): 18th October 2022
Final Enquiry Answered(YAY!!!): 19th October 2022

Deposit sent AND ALL legal fees(up to this point) paid: 19th October 2022
Mortgage Advance funds confirmation requested by solicitor: 19th October 2022
Mortgage Advance funds green light by lender: 25nd October 2022
Exchange of Contracts: 25nd October 2022

Completion: 7th November 2022

Final thoughts:
Mortgage application was easy I'm surprised how quick it was and got approved.
I think using the Experian mortgage search helped as it was able to use my credit report to search lenders that satisfy their lending criteria(I think).
Oh and I used Experian by accident. I only wanted to check my credit score in-depth after sign up free trial, then I saw there was a section for mortgages and was just curious how much I could borrow.
I then decided I wanted to buy a flat that night after figuring out I could get a flat with my savings I had.

Make sure the seller has all documentation, what was holding up was missing pages of the Lease.
Eventually we found the certified copy of the lease with all pages.
The seller was to blame for not registering it to Land Registry.

I’m so happy TSB has and still offers mortgage extension. If I did not had that I would be paying rates at 6.5%.
I almost cried at one point because I know I would not be able to pay those rates. I was desperate and mentally unstable later stages.

Exchange and Completion setup was ok too.
Though I had to wait 1.5 weeks to Complete and in that time I was so mentally exhausted.

I learnt so much as a FTB in a stressful way, but next time I'll know what to expect ;-)

1616six

RM_2013 said:

1616six said:

Another day with no updates 😂

Emailed the agent, got an out of office reply

Wont pester the solicitor just yet as only heard from her on Thursday to say she’d had a response to enquiries but not all were answered so she’s gone back to the sellers solicitor to chase. Will email her on Wednesday if I don’t hear. 

I’m only stressing because our mortgage offer expiry means we really need to complete before Xmas. If we can just get confirmation that we can exchange by the end of Nov and complete first couple of weeks of Dec Il be more than happy. 

If we exchange by the end of Nov, il save £700 rent by giving our 1 month notice in Nov rather than Dec… so I’m hoping they’ll get it done!

Good luck to the rest in similar boats…

I was going to chase Weds but not sure I can wait that long 🤣

😂 I’ve just caved and emailed my solicitor to see if they’ve heard back. 

I don’t think I’m wrong to be chasing, in theory we need to exchange in the next 2/3 weeks and compete in 4/5weeks max - the pressure is on now.

EDIT:
Shes just replied “the sellers solicitor has been chased.”

Brilliant… 🙈

RM_2013

@1616six 🤣🤣🤣
I caved as well and chased them this morning because our buyers had messaged to say there was an outstanding enquiry.
i haven’t had any replies back yet. 

Our buyers want to move asap so feeling the pressure 

julicorn

RM_2013 said:

julicorn said:

We're attempting to exchange on our sale towards the end of this week, only completing just before Christmas though. 

In the meantime, we're waiting for the conveyancing on our new purchase to catch up. It would be great if we could complete on the same day as we're moving out of our current home, but will see (current plan B is to annoy friends and family for a few weeks over Christmas and then airbnb, with our belongings in storage). 

Good luck with everything and fingers crossed you can co ordinate the sale and purchase for less hassle for you 

Thank you so much! It definitely would be nicer if it worked out that way. 

sophieo16

Hello all, 

Wanting to join this thread to feel like I'm on the journey with others and give me something tangible to work off of! 

I'm a FTB and my partner is selling his new build (He bought approx 2-3 years ago) for us to purchase together. 

I have all of the deposit for the property we want to purchase and my partner's equity from the sale of his home will go to renovating it (well, part of it). We want his sale to go through as quickly as possible and can move in with family in between homes. When things weren't looking very rosy in terms of actually getting an offer accepted, we were planning on moving in with family and then finding somewhere to rent once his sale had gone through (thinking it would be quick...how wrong we were). 

My partner doesn't have the flexibility to answer phone calls and emails etc. at work and his home doesn't have my name on it, so we have agreed that he deals with his sale while I deal with the purchase and everything that comes with it. 

Rough timescales

Timeline- Sale (to FTB)

2 April- On the market
8 April- Offer received
8 April- Offer accepted

From there, all of the paperwork from both sides (from what I can tell) has been done swiftly. The big issue we have been having is the management company for the new build estate his home is on not getting back to solicitors for months on end. The 2nd phase of the estate was delayed due to COVID, so the solicitors believe that the management company don't believe the estate is their responsibility until it is complete.

Finally after approx 4 months of waiting the management company completed paperwork

7 November - Partner is asked from our solicitor when he would like to complete (ASAP is his answer) and solicitor is asking buyers the same question. We are still waiting. 


Timeline- Purchase (Vacant)

March: Initial mortgage broker meeting to work out how much we can borrow together
March: Start the search for a property
God knows how many viewings and rejected offers later...
30 July: Offer was initially rejected on the property we are buying. They went with a lower offer that was "more proceedible"
God knows how many more viewings and rejected offers later...
12 September: House comes back on the market and we put the offer back in 
16 September: Offer FINALLY accepted 
16 September: Solicitor instructed
20 September: Mortgage application put in 
20 September: The client care pack was filled out  and searches paid for
w/c 26 September: Mortgage application accepted, but £5k down valuation recommended from valuer due to "damp" walls (mortgage company waived this and offered full mortgage amount required but recommended a damp report)
6 October: Level 3 Surveyor organised
17 October: Level 3 Survey received (Damp was flagged but not as urgent to sort as there was no visual evidence inside the home. We have organised a damp and timber surveyor to be on the safe side)
21 October: Damp and Timber Survey organised after delay in communication with EA
3rd November: Searches completed 
18 November: Damp Surveyor due (He is a man in demand!)

.....and now we have just been told that the seller's pack was sent to the wrong address. so approx, 6 weeks after the offer has been accepted and we still have no info from the seller. They will have to take time to fill this in too, as it is a deceased estate so they may not have all info to hand.

It has to be a blessing in disguise, seeing as though we are waiting for a completion date on my partner's sale still.. and that the damp and timber survey couldn't be done quickly unless I went elsewhere.   

We are debating whether we should negotiate if the damp report flags something unexpected? (it also recommended a rewire soon, which we expected). We are very aware that mortgage companies are a little on edge. We don't want to negotiate the house price, have to have it go back through the underwriter for them to tell us that we need to be put through their affordability check at a much higher rate and then pull the mortgage. We have asked our broker about this but he is yet to come back. Does anyone have any experience of this?

We managed to get a rate of 3.94% before products started getting pulled from the market. I really don't want to lose that for the sake of knocking a couple of k off of the price


Wow. Long post. Sorry!