Slow solicitors, getting nervous

Ftbnewbie

We offered on a house towards end of September and it was accepted, then our house sold 2 days later. We then got to work with full mortgage application, survey and getting a solicitor and searches underway. This took about 4 weeks for searches, and survey results to come back etc. At first the solicitor seemed to be fairly active but then suddenly, it seemed quiet and I wasn’t getting replies to emails or messages etc

After 2 weeks of radio silence, I rang and got a little shirty to find the person handling my case had left with immediate effect. ( I assume they were flirted off as they were pretty rubbish and hadn’t done much other than order searches ).
We were assigned a new case handler and I expressed that we wanted to complete by 23rd November with exchange a week prior. This apparently sounded reasonable and doable to them.
Fast forward to now and the vendor and her EA are asking what’s taking so long as the sellers vendor is getting annoyed and anxious. ( I will add however that her offer was only accepted 2nd week in October ).
My buyer is a first time buyer and his survey and mortgage offer came through at exactly same time as ours. I can’t understand why it’s still dragging on so slowly as we are now having to hope for exchange this week to move next week instead. We didn’t want to start moving in December at all as it’s too close to Christmas and difficult with time from work etc.

I have been chasing this elusive report on my purchase I’ve apparently been “almost ready” to receive for a couple of weeks too.

I don’t know what else I can do, we have even signed contracts and deed forms ready for when exchange happens.

Anyone else pulled their hair out with a slow process from solicitors?

I’ve sent another email this morning stating I insist on exchange this week and asking them to chase the buyers solicitor rather than sit back and wait til they bother to get in touch with us. Is this too forward?

T0mmyh

Pick up the phone.. or failing that go to the solicitors... emails are too easy to ignore

lika_86

Sounds pretty quick to me to be honest.

Ftbnewbie

It seems every time I phone, I either get “ I’ll leave a message for your case handler to call you back” or “ I’m just finishing your report to send to you”. I’ve insisted they put the dates we were aiming for over to the other side , but don’t know if that’s actually happened. It’s so frustrating and reading online reviews they actually score pretty good. We didn’t go for the cheapest solicitors either, we went middle of the road hoping it would be a better service 😤.

JoJo1978

You mention your vendor’s vendor, is that the top of the chain though? Exchange won’t take place until the whole chain is ready even if your links are.

You are also waiting for a report, do you know what this is and who it is coming from, perhaps it’s possible for you to chase directly on it?

Have you also spoke to to the estate agents up and down the chain to make sure that everyone is working to your timeline?

Is the nervousness you mention simply that l, or is there a real danger of the chain breaking? I’ve found that communicating and finding these things out has helped my stress levels.

I feel your pain, we have been waiting two months to exchange. Everything is being held up by one link in our chain, our buyer. We’re now apparently a week off exchange but I’ll believe it when it happens!

Ftbnewbie

Thanks jojo1978

There are 4 of us in total. My first time buyers, us, our vendor and then her vendor. Her vendor was renting this property out but has decided to sell it. It seems the stress and demands are coming directly from the top even though it’s only been just over 4 weeks since he accepted the offer. He apparently doesn’t want the house empty now the tenants have finally left.
My vendor and ourselves have signed draft contracts and I’ve chased my EA to find out if our buyer is ready to exchange too.
The report is apparently something the solicitor sends after all enquiries are dealt with to give us an opinion on everything and all the answers to enquiries. I’m just stressing as I’ve been told to expect this report via email for nearly 2 weeks now.
I know I’m probably just stressing for nothing but I get the feeling the top of the chain thinks we are holding things up despite us doing our best. We even paid for searches prior to formal mortgage offer and survey report as we knew vendor wanted a quick sale.

RedFraggle

"Reporting to client" is how they term informing you of anything of note in searches, titles etc. that may be an issue. They will also make any intials queries with your vendors solicitor ahead of this that they think necessary based on the information they have. For example some of the things in our were a restrictive covenant on the property and the fact there is an area of potential land instability within 50 meters.
We are currently in a chain of 3 properties with a cash buyer at the bottom and an emigration at the top and it took 3 months to reach exchange.

Ftbnewbie

I was wondering what else they could be reporting on as I had the search results back several weeks ago. I suppose I’m letting the impatience from the top of the chain get me in knots over it all, but I do wish that solicitors were more proactive , especially when 3 weeks ago it was pretty sure we would have exchanged by now and completing by next weekend. I’m just dreading if it runs into December with Christmas coming up etc.

Thrugelmir

Ftbnewbie wrote: »

but I do wish that solicitors were more proactive , especially when 3 weeks ago it was pretty sure we would have exchanged by now and completing by next weekend.

Unfortunately neither you nor your solicitors have any influence on the remainder of the chain. Everybody has their own agenda. Little point in setting dates until everybody is in a position to even start discussing them.