The NEW waiting to exchange thread...

bouzer

Jumping on here need some positivity. 

So found out unexpectedly  I was pregnant beginning of March, baby due November 1st, was living with inlaws to save for a house, found a house we loved, chain free and empty, put an offer in mid March and offer accepted. Plenty of time for when babies due...wrong! Next thing lockdown happens.... absolutely nothing happens until July when we can finally apply for mortgage with 10% deposit. 

 After a lot of back and forth with damp and timber report and slow lenders finally get an approved offer and begin solicitors searches.
Searches come back okay and 15 enquiries raised with sellers a couple of weeks ago and had absolutely nothing since. We’ve had F&F and draft contracts back etc just awaiting enquiries.
The stress of having our baby due in about 4 weeks has me waking up in the middle of the night sobbing, I just want this house sorted and feel like I have waited a lifetime.

The sellers are now holding things up not responding to enquiries, which when reading through them seemed pretty simple. The house is empty, we are FTB and as far as we are aware are chain free. I have chased my solicitors who have chased the sellers solicitors but they have said they are “awaiting their client’s instructions”. Where do I go from here? Just continue to wait?

shaunad93

Patiently waiting for Skipton to transfer my LISA funds to my solicitor today. Just called Skipton and they advised it could be any point throughout the day up until 5pm. Don’t you hate when things are out of your control 😩

AlwaysWanderlusting

Tabitharocks said:

FTB here! So my timeline is as follows:-

• Offer accepted on property- 3rd July
• Solicitors instructed- 3rd July
• Full Mortgage approved- 19th August
• Homebuyers survey- 9th September
• Land searches received- 11th September
• Draft contracts from vendors sent to my solicitors-12th September

So my Homebuyers Survey has shown high levels of damp so I instructed a damp surveyor to go round last week.  They have just quoted me £3000+ to fix the issues and I am now having to try and negotiate with the seller to see what can be done about this.... fingers crossed.  If nothing can be done, I guess I will have to pull out as £3000+ is unaffordable at the moment and the damp is quite extensive.  Eeek...

Fingers crossed they meet you halfway at least. I was in a similar position 6 or so weeks ago. It was quite nerve-wrecking but you're in a good position as FTB and have a mortgage offer etc. Be wary of what the damp survey says though - my specialist survey barely mentioned the cause of the damp and was much more focused on pushing for a new damp proof course and plasterboarding entire walls! The information in my level 3 survey was much more useful. 

AlwaysWanderlusting

bouzer said:

Jumping on here need some positivity. 

So found out unexpectedly  I was pregnant beginning of March, baby due November 1st, was living with inlaws to save for a house, found a house we loved, chain free and empty, put an offer in mid March and offer accepted. Plenty of time for when babies due...wrong! Next thing lockdown happens.... absolutely nothing happens until July when we can finally apply for mortgage with 10% deposit. 

 After a lot of back and forth with damp and timber report and slow lenders finally get an approved offer and begin solicitors searches.
Searches come back okay and 15 enquiries raised with sellers a couple of weeks ago and had absolutely nothing since. We’ve had F&F and draft contracts back etc just awaiting enquiries.
The stress of having our baby due in about 4 weeks has me waking up in the middle of the night sobbing, I just want this house sorted and feel like I have waited a lifetime.

The sellers are now holding things up not responding to enquiries, which when reading through them seemed pretty simple. The house is empty, we are FTB and as far as we are aware are chain free. I have chased my solicitors who have chased the sellers solicitors but they have said they are “awaiting their client’s instructions”. Where do I go from here? Just continue to wait?

That sounds very stressful (but congratulations!). That seems bizarre on the part of the seller but I suppose it depends what the enquiries are.  I know with my purchase the seller's solicitor seemed to be delaying coming back on enquiries because they thought we would use the information to get money off (which I didn't, I just wanted a clear account of what work had been done and when) and I presume they thought I'd let them go if they left it long enough. 
Have you reiterated that you're (obviously) very keen to complete ASAP and this is the only thing holding things up? If not, would try that as some gentle pressure (or you may need to be a bit more bullish and say you absolutely need to complete by X) 

Hanstar007

First time poster on here..... always around these forums but never posted.  But thought we'll post our progress.... our timeline is as follows:-

• Viewings of 10 properties:  01/06/20 to 10/08/20
• Viewing of the property we like:  10/08/20 at 1700hrs
• Offer made on property:  10/08/20 at 1830hrs (asking price - as we knew that there were many similar properties going for around that price)
• Offer accepted on property:  10/08/20 at 2030hrs (yes it came to a shock to us!)
• Solicitors instructed:  21/08/20
  
• Mortgage broker instructed:  21/08/20
• Land searches received:  05/09/20
• Valuation:  15/09/20
• Draft contracts from vendors sent to my solicitors:  12/09/20
• Comments sent back to vendor solicitors:  28/09/20
• Mortgage offer approved:  30/09/2020

Exciting times - anticipate to exchange and complete mid Nov.  We were wondering whether any other folks are a bit nervous of chains falling through or the completion date being moved with the current riff raff of Covid and potential lockdown restrictions?

Stay safe

Tabitharocks

AlwaysWanderlusting said:

Tabitharocks said:

FTB here! So my timeline is as follows:-

• Offer accepted on property- 3rd July
• Solicitors instructed- 3rd July
• Full Mortgage approved- 19th August
• Homebuyers survey- 9th September
• Land searches received- 11th September
• Draft contracts from vendors sent to my solicitors-12th September

So my Homebuyers Survey has shown high levels of damp so I instructed a damp surveyor to go round last week.  They have just quoted me £3000+ to fix the issues and I am now having to try and negotiate with the seller to see what can be done about this.... fingers crossed.  If nothing can be done, I guess I will have to pull out as £3000+ is unaffordable at the moment and the damp is quite extensive.  Eeek...

Fingers crossed they meet you halfway at least. I was in a similar position 6 or so weeks ago. It was quite nerve-wrecking but you're in a good position as FTB and have a mortgage offer etc. Be wary of what the damp survey says though - my specialist survey barely mentioned the cause of the damp and was much more focused on pushing for a new damp proof course and plasterboarding entire walls! The information in my level 3 survey was much more useful. 

Yeah, I mean both the homebuyers survey and damp survey have shown damp in the same areas and stated its rising damp (its a basement flat).  I have sent both of these to the seller but haven't heard anything back.  I have suggested the seller could do the work themselves or we could compromise and I pay for it to be done if the house price is negotiated.  Of course, happy to meet halfway if needs.... just awaiting a response!! 

28tsw

Anyone any ideas on redemption statement request turnarounds? Requested Monday no sign of it due to complete Tuesday...

atrixa

After a ton of stress last week, we've now agreed to a new purchase price, so I'm just waiting on getting the reduction to the mortgage sorted then it should be all go.

Sparklestar1127

So we are supposed to be completing Friday and haven’t exchanged yet..... buyers lender hasn’t sent confirmation of release of funds and they won’t exchange without it. 😬😬😬

chillicheesedog

Completed today! Our first home 🥳
Here's my timeline:
26/06 offer made and accepted 
03/07 appointment with HSBC for mortgage (90%LTV, remember those?)
30/07 mortgage offer 
28/08 exchanged
30/09 completed! 

While it felt incredibly stressful and long, in reality, nothing went wrong and we had really lovely sellers who we dealt with directly without an EA between. 
Went to the house today and brought toilet roll (as I've read people have been caught short before 😂) and they left us a note and a bottle of champagne.

3 months seems quite fast in fact and especially during current times, but because we had a house fall through before, we were very anxious throughout. 
I'm very glad I didn't wait because we'd not been able to buy if we had waited even one month.

Good luck everyone, this forum has been a real source of comfort and where I could vent some anxious tensions!