FTB - Week 17 of process - seller is selfish a-hole

littlemissrach

Hi all,

Very frustrated first time buyers here just after a bit of a sounding board and thoughts from others (I think I also just need somewhere to vent before I explode)

We are both living at our parents, the people we are buying off (Mr X) are moving into a house which is empty.

When we viewed the house they advised they were after first time buyers as a previous sale had fallen through, they also wanted a quick sale, we were told as the house was empty this would also simplify things in the chain...
We are now in week 17 of the house buying process.

Our house timescales;

Viewed house: 26/6/2017
Offer accepted: 27/6/2017
Mortgage application: 30/6/2017
Survey fee taken: 30/6/2017 & 3/7/2017
Solicitors formally instructed: 4/7/2017
Survey: 12/7/2017
Mortgage approved: 14/7/2017
Survey report: 18/7/2017
Searches instructed: 20/7/2017

Every time we rang for updates we were informed by the Estate Agent that Mr X was at a ‘similar stage to us’, as naive first time buyers we carried through the process.. then the Estate Agent dropped the bomb around week 7 that they found Mr X hadn’t made a full mortgage application (jumping from approval in principle with different lenders and something to do with redemption fee).

There were a few bits on the survey which we would need to look into once in and budget for some overdue maintenance, but nothing really urgent so we just carried on with the process.

Mr X timescales;

Mortgage application: Around mid August
Survey: 8/9/2017
Mortgage approved: 21/9/2017
Survey report: 21/9/2017
Searches instructed: 6/10/2017

I won’t go into the finer detail of how much of a selfish a-hole this guy has been throughout this process and made it a very unpleasant experience for us.. we, along with the people they are buying off had to make threats to pull out and stipulate timescales to get any sort of progress.

Fast forward to where we are now.. Our paperwork has been in place and ready for completion for a significant number of weeks, we just need to pay our Solicitor’s bill and there are 3 enquiries that our Solicitor is awaiting some further information on which should hopefully be back this week.

Mr X’s searches came back 20/10/2017, there are 10 enquiries ongoing at the moment but we are assured that they are working through them.

We have been pushing for an estimated timescale in absence of a formal date being agreed which our Solicitor advised can be done after enquiries have been responded to.

We put a proposed timescale to aim for completion of mid November.. the estate agent has come back today saying that Mr X is not committing to any timescales, both Estate agents agreed there is no reason for this and so are pushing forward to aim for this working with the solicitors in a ‘pincer move’ to give him no reason to delay further.

We are a little worried how long ago now our survey was completed and potentially for all we know we are currently 4 months down and we would have no idea if there has been any changes to the condition / if anything has gone wrong...

We have told them that if our mortgage offer expires in December, we won’t be reapplying and will be walking away from the process.

We have learnt a lot after going through the process to where we are now and naivety / lack of knowledge of it all has probably contributed to our frustrations.

Is there any advice anyone could give on any parts of our situation? Anything would be really appreciated.

shortcrust

What you've said really just sounds like a very typical experience of buying a house. My advice is to be as calm and as patient as possible. Things are moving.

Really don't worry about the survey being 4 months old!

Cakeguts

Just thought you would like to know that the last house we bought took 5 months from offer to completion. We were paying cash and the house we were buying was vacant. So just us with no mortgage and a vacant house and it was 5 months.

AdrianC

Now you know why their previous sale fell through.

G_M

Buyers (and sellers!) always want and expect things to move faster than they do.

And it always moves slower.

You can either

* relax, be patient,open a bottle, and just let things progress when they do

* jump up and down, shout at everyone, watch your blood pressure rise, and keep your fingers crossed for no heart attack

* give the seller a deadline to....Exchange?... get survey done...? and threaten to walk away if not (best decide if you'd follow through)

* walk away now

sulphate

As the seller's searches are back and they are working through enquiries it really shouldn't take much longer. What is the situation with the house the sellers are buying? Is it at the top of the chain?

I do feel your pain, we put our house on the market in February and didn't move until August, and probably would have dragged on another month had I not insisted on the completion date. It's been a stressful year!

The_Real_Cheddar_Bob

I think this is one of the clear pitfalls of buying a house. Spending money + emotion = undue stress.

As you are living with your parents, you do not have the issue of being middle of a chain. I am sure that the house sale is going as quickly as possible, although it may not seem like it.

Lauralou79

As someone that went through all this for the first time this year, I can honestly say it's one of the most stressful and frustrating processes I've ever been through.
It sounds like you are nearly there. Our enquiries stage seemed to run for ages! But we got there in the end tho I really had to push the solicitors towards exchange.
It'll be worth it.

tori.k

If it helps our offer was excepted beginning of June due to title issues we are now looking to complete around May/ June next year, these things happen, frustrating as it is I'm just looking at the positive the more we can save the less I need to borrow on the mortgage.

jrrowleyws

Make sure you view the house again before exchange. Plenty can change in 6 months in an empty property.

dancing_star

Sympathies. Going through the same. Vendor will not answer the phone to EA or her conveyancers.

It's probably too late for me to offer and exchange on another property and still retain current mortgage offer.

I'm going bonkers.