How early do we need to exchange???

Bongofish

Hi all!

We have put a reservation down on a new build (£1000). On the paperwork it says that they want to exchange contracts on the 3rd February even thought the house won’t be built until June?

This is causing us to feel very rushed with our mortgage and also very impatient with our broker. He has told us that it’s ok for them to do this but not to feel to pressurised by the dates.

The builder is Taylor Whimpey. Anyone any advice whether we should be contacting them and saying we want longer? As we don’t want to start the solicitors off fully until we have a clear mortgage offer....we have started them but they are at the very beginning.

Thanks

kingstreet

Newbuilds pretty much all work on a 28 day exchange of contracts target. Builders want your commitment as early as possible as they have to order materials to spec the property the way you want it.

As long as you are making progress, they probably won't have an issue with you going a few days over but the deal you have made is based on you hitting that date, so they can look to alter it if you don't meet the deadline.

Bongofish

I understand them wanting commitment early but our broker was abit surprised at 4 months early. We had hoped previously that we would have had to have a mortgage in place by April giving us plenty of time to shop around and review. We reserved on 23rd of December and everywhere was basically closed for 2 weeks. Now we have 3 weeks to get a mortgage and we don’t even have a full application submitted as our broker seems to be very slow .

Thrugelmir

Bongofish wrote: »

I understand them wanting commitment early but our broker was abit surprised at 4 months early.

Then your broker doesn't appear well informed. As 4 week exchange has been the norm for a considerable amount of time. However developers do have flexibility. Providing the transaction is actually progressing, i.e. you have a mortgage offer i place and your solicitor is undertaking the neccessary due diligence. Then the requirement to exchange in 4 weeks will be allowed to slip.

Developers want a 4 week exchange in order to weed out time wasters. Large scale developements require forward planning. Labour, materials, tradespeople etc need to be resourced. Four months isn't long when building a house. An lot has to come together to achieve it. Little point in expending time and money on a property which isn't yet sold.

Dolly123

Nothing unusual about this at all, some developers sell 6-9 months before completion and still require you to exchange within 6 weeks, they want the commitment otherwise if you don't exchange then they have wasted a house on you that they could of sold to someone else,

robgoode

We’ve been instructed to go through the mortgage application with exchange due 5th February. Not due to move in until May. Started the calls to the broker today to get the ball rolling.