House Sale - what would you do?

que-sera-sera_2

A bit of background info...

We put our 3 bed semi detached house up for sale in February. It was listed at £169,950. We had 6 viewings booked within 24 hours and 3 offers were made. We accepted an offer at 3 grand above asking.
We hadn’t found anywhere to purchase at this point. We have since viewed 12 houses but none have been suitable. Perhaps we are being too fussy but we are hoping our next purchase will be our ‘forever home’ therefore it has to be right.
Ideally we wanted to find somewhere to buy before completing on our sale however we did have the option of moving in with the in-laws if needs be.
The sale has progressed nicely. Our buyers have had their survey done, we have provided all relevant paperwork etc. We have not yet exchanged.
Obviously things are now up in the air with the whole covid situation. Nobody knows what’s going to happen. Will the housing market crash? Possibly.
Our buyers have not pulled out of the sale (yet) so we are assuming they are still happy to go ahead.
We just don’t know what to do going forward. We have nowhere to buy and obviously cannot view anywhere. Moving in with the in-laws is not really an option now as my MIL is classed as high risk re. coronavirus.
The way we see it we have 2 options...
A - pull out, apologise to our buyers, pay any solicitors fees we have accrued so far and wait for the dust to settle. Try to sell again next year. With this, there is obviously the risk of house prices falling. We sold our house quickly this time round, and for a good price. This may not happen next time.
B - continue with the sale, exchange/complete and try to find somewhere to rent temporarily. Our concern with this option is the fact we may not be able to find anywhere to purchase any time soon therefore we will end up in rented indefinitely.

To add to the above, we LOVE where we currently live. We love our cul-de-sac, we love our neighbours and we are very happy here. The only reason we are selling is to buy somewhere bigger. We have 2 young children therefore we want the least disruption as possible.

If you were in our situation, what would you do? 

Comms69

It seems your logic for not doing 2, doesnt stand up to the prospect of selling at all?

If there's nowhere you want to buy, whether you stay or rent makes no difference. If there is, there's no reason to assume you'd rent indefintely.

SMR710

I would keep on the selling process with your current buyers, keep your fingers crossed they hang on in there, take the money and run (when you can) 

Thrugelmir

Have a conversation through the EA with your buyers. Ascertain their views. 

ProDave

If you love where you are, but it is too small, how about stay there and extend it?

kazwookie

Stay where you are, remove the house off the market.

Make what you have work for you and the family

que-sera-sera_2

ProDave said:

If you love where you are, but it is too small, how about stay there and extend it?

Sorry for the delayed reply!
There is no scope for us to extend unfortunately. Our plot isn’t huge and our only option would be to extend sideways onto the drive. The drive isn’t very wide so it wouldn’t give us much more space.
We can’t even go up into the loft as we have a low pitched roof and there is not enough head height.
Believe me, we have discussed every option. If we could extend and make this house work for us we would. We are so sad to be leaving!
We have considered staying here and just working with what we have. We don’t plan on extending our family and our house isn’t tiny by any means. But, after viewing other properties, we are both itching for more space and a bigger garden and a new project.
As it stands now, we are due to complete week commencing 13th July, eeeeek! We still haven’t found anywhere but we have resigned ourselves to the fact we will rent temporarily and hopefully, the right house will come up soon!

que-sera-sera_2

SMR710 said:

I would keep on the selling process with your current buyers, keep your fingers crossed they hang on in there, take the money and run (when you can) 

Thank you! We are due to exchange and complete week commencing 13th July, eeeeeek!
Very scary and I am feeling very nervous but a change is as good as the rest?! 😬

eidand

Look at this from a positive angle. If you sell, you have the cash. You can choose an area, go and rent there for a while and wait until you see the right property come on the market. Then you can move at lightning speed.
There is also the chance that the sale will fall through for some reason. If it does, happy days, you don't need to move yet.
What I would not do is buy somewhere out of desperation.

gwynlas

If you go into rental you will be tied into a 6.12 monthe contract but this would give you the opportunity to see how mrket is performing.
Why do you think you would be completing in July when you have yet to exchange and don't know as yet if your buyers are prepared to proceed at agreed price?

que-sera-sera_2

gwynlas said:

If you go into rental you will be tied into a 6.12 monthe contract but this would give you the opportunity to see how mrket is performing.
Why do you think you would be completing in July when you have yet to exchange and don't know as yet if your buyers are prepared to proceed at agreed price?

Our buyers solicitor has been chasing for an exchange/completion date. We are exchanging and completing the week commencing 13th July.
Our buyers haven’t tried to re-negotiate the price thankfully! We ourselves were surprised by this but nope, they are happy to proceed at the agreed price 😃