The NEW waiting to exchange thread...

TamsinC

I honestly think our sellers have a screw loose. Having pushed and pushed and pushed to exchange and complete asap they now want a 5 week gap between exchange and completion! We were all set to go for next Monday and own the house by the end of the week. Now only exchange happening (hopefully).
Give me strength.

superdeemon

The whole process for me and my partner has been marred by the vendor's using a useless conveyancing firm who took months to respond.

Timeline
22/02 - Visit MB and get DIP from Nationwide
23/02 - Put offer in
26/02 - Offer accepted
26/02 - Full application submitted
ENTER BEAST FROM THE EAST
12/03 - Nationwide Valuation
19/03 - Mortgage offer
23/03 - Homebuyers Survey
24/03 - Searches / Enquiries Raised
APRIL / MAY / JUNE - No response from seller's solicitor to enquiries. Chase multiple times. Down to sheer incompetence.
05/07 - Enquiries partly satisfied. Still outstanding enquiries that seller's solicitor needs to satisfy (very basic stuff).
07/08 (Yes August) - Deposits paid to solicitors in anticipation of exchange.
13/08 (Today) - Waiting for seller's solicitors to confirm in position to exchange.

In short it has been 5 months and 22 days since the offer was accepted and our mortgage offer runs out in 4-weeks. The seller's solicitors are absolutely woeful and our solicitors have been pulling their hair out.

The saga continues.

Edit: We are FTB and there is no chain. The property is currently sat empty (has been since Feb).

Surrey_EA

timefortea wrote: »

Three people I know who've recently bought houses are telling me that exchange and completion happens on the same day and that's normal, but the prevailing opinion on MSE seems to be that it's not. Does anyone know if there are regional differences? I'd really rather have a week or two in between but if that's not the norm in my area I don't suppose I'll get it.

It's certainly not something I would describe as normal.

The only circumstances where exchanging and completing on the same day should be considered is when the property is vacant and the buyer has no related sale.

nwithers1

First time buyers, buying a new build, leasehold with HTB. Was told completion was due mid July.
Timeline:

17/3 Reservation fee paid, HTB/mortgage applied for through advisor
26/3 Solicitors instructed
10/4 Help to buy ATP received
10/5 Mortgage offer received from Barclays
1/6 Searches submitted by conveyancer
10/7 Environmental reports/searches etc. received
26/7 Solicitor told us she'd email and post the full reports including contracts for us to sign
2/8 Solicitor actually emailed reports
2/8 House was completed, signed off, certified. Ready to live in.
8/8 Reports/contracts finally turned up in the post
8/8 Our contract from our current, rented flat ended. We had to put everything in storage and move in to a friend's spare room
10/8 Solicitor's expected day for exchanging contracts (with completion arranged for 16/8). Delayed due to awaiting some confirmation from the lender
13/8 Lender (Barclays) delays again - needs to review ground rent and send info to valuation team

The 16th August has been agreed as a completion date, but for some reason Barclays valuation team need to review the costs of our ground rent, despite having been informed of the leasehold since March. Apparently the valuation team usually take 3-5 days to respond, though we've been told our case has been expedited to get a reply sooner.
Help to Buy need 2 days between Exchange and Completion, so if Barclays do not get back to us by tomorrow, we will not be able to complete on the set day.

The house has been ready since the beginning of August. We've trying to get this sorted since March (5 months!). We've told our solicitors all along that our renting contract ends early August. We're living in a friend's spare room and we still don't know if we can get the keys this week or if we have to impose on someone else for longer.
Even worse - I don't know why Barclays are having to question the ground rent at this stage (or at all), and I just hope that this won't cause them to pull out at the last minute and leave us with nowhere to live.

sondy

Oh the frustration!
Friday was meant to be our exchange date - solicitors said they couldn't get through to other solicitor and Monday would be the day. Today we got an email (expecting it to say that we had exchanged and now they say they have chased other solicitors but nothing back!) this is so so frustrating as we are supposed to be moving next Monday! No idea how to play it.

PassingOutInTheParade

superdeemon wrote: »

The whole process for me and my partner has been marred by the vendor's using a useless conveyancing firm who took months to respond.

Timeline
22/02 - Visit MB and get DIP from Nationwide
23/02 - Put offer in
26/02 - Offer accepted
26/02 - Full application submitted
ENTER BEAST FROM THE EAST
12/03 - Nationwide Valuation
19/03 - Mortgage offer
23/03 - Homebuyers Survey
24/03 - Searches / Enquiries Raised
APRIL / MAY / JUNE - No response from seller's solicitor to enquiries. Chase multiple times. Down to sheer incompetence.
05/07 - Enquiries partly satisfied. Still outstanding enquiries that seller's solicitor needs to satisfy (very basic stuff).
07/08 (Yes August) - Deposits paid to solicitors in anticipation of exchange.
13/08 (Today) - Waiting for seller's solicitors to confirm in position to exchange.

In short it has been 5 months and 22 days since the offer was accepted and our mortgage offer runs out in 4-weeks. The seller's solicitors are absolutely woeful and our solicitors have been pulling their hair out.

The saga continues.

Edit: We are FTB and there is no chain. The property is currently sat empty (has been since Feb).

In a similar situation whereby the seller's solicitor is totally useless ie not informing/reminding them that they needed to verify their ID, not returning incomplete documents.....

We are almost 4 months in and our solicitors have only just been sent the draft contract pack.

Sometimes I think there is much less motivation with a 'no chain' sale.

2004nsnazir

Yay!!!!!! Just been told we have exchanged. With completion on 20th. Can the completion date change as I need to book day off to pick keys. We wont be moving in straight away but want the keys when available.


Do I need to do anything else?

FTBNow

sondy wrote: »

Oh the frustration!
Friday was meant to be our exchange date - solicitors said they couldn't get through to other solicitor and Monday would be the day. Today we got an email (expecting it to say that we had exchanged and now they say they have chased other solicitors but nothing back!) this is so so frustrating as we are supposed to be moving next Monday! No idea how to play it.

We're the same - except completion meant to be this coming Friday and our vendors solicitor has sent it up to a senior solicitor who still hasn't signed off on the completed file.

I've just had enough now!

Surrey_EA

2004nsnazir wrote: »

Yay!!!!!! Just been told we have exchanged. With completion on 20th. Can the completion date change as I need to book day off to pick keys. We wont be moving in straight away but want the keys when available.

Congratulations :beer:

Whilst not completely unheard of, it is so tremendously rare it's not worth worrying about, so you should take it that the completion will happen on 20.08.18

2004nsnazir wrote: »

Do I need to do anything else?

Have you arranged buildings insurance? (if not already covered by a freeholder/management company)

2004nsnazir

Surrey_EA wrote: »

Congratulations :beer:

Whilst not completely unheard of, it is so tremendously rare it's not worth worrying about, so you should take it that the completion will happen on 20.08.18



Have you arranged buildings insurance? (if not already covered by a freeholder/management company)

Buildings insurance was needed for exchange. so I took that out on Saturday.


Such a relief.