Do we have any chance?

cherry_blossom_6

We found a buyer for our house back in August. He had no chain, great we though.
He has dragged his feet the whole way along. We are not using an estate agent. He had 3 surveys, they said they would hold back £5k so we agreed a price £2k less than the origional one.
Then we had a call out of the blue for another survey. We phoned buyers mortage advisor who is pants and told us he was changing product to a better one in the same company.
So it turns out it was a different company, and he hadn't told the buyer, and then they also said they would hold back £5k, off the NEW PRICE. Not a problem though apparently, buyer says they will pay the extra.

So buyer tells us surveys are all done, all he needs now is a form from the inland revenue for this new mortgage to say he is self employed (not a proof of income apparently). He says he ordered this form a couple of weeks ago and they said it would be 4 days. It still isn't here so Friday he phoned for another one. So far nothing.

We have told him we must exchange by the 14th, but can complete any time in January. We are moving to Australia and I HAVE to be there before the 4th of Feb, or we will have to cancel the whole thing. Ovbiously we need a month to then hand in our notice. So we do have one weeks grace after the 14th, but we haven't told them that.

Buyer has said he may have to go down and pick the form up, BUT our solicitor today said that if the mortgage hasn't been fully offered yet then there is no way we will exchange before Christmas. Buyers mortgage advisor has told us that is rubbish as we will have enough to just exchange.

Now I don't know who to believe, and we have some HUGE desissions to make if it doesn't look like it will happen in time. We have been told porkies by solicitors when we bought our house 'it will never complete by that day, ohhh, we managed it', so I'm not sure if this is an often used tacktic to make themselves look good.

Any advice would be great.

lynzpower

it sounds like three surveys is 3 different lenders. they are offering him a lower mortgage than he can ive with by the looks of it, and therefore moves onto other lenders to see what they can offer.

So buyer tells us surveys are all done, all he needs now is a form from the inland revenue for this new mortgage to say he is self employed (not a proof of income apparently). He says he ordered this form a couple of weeks ago and they said it would be 4 days. It still isn't here so Friday he phoned for another one. So far nothing.

Erm did he not realise he was self employed back in August?
I would abort with this buyer. August is a long time ago, I would have expect you would have completed by now.

cherry_blossom_6

Aborting is not something I want to do. We have been planning this more to Australia for a year, if we abort we will have to wait another year, and that is assuming we find a buyer. It took a year and 3 months and two falllen through sales to find this one.
The first 3 surveys were for one mortgage company (extra surveys were electrics, damp, timber etc) and then the 4th was for another company. Apparently for the first mortgage company all he had needed was proof of income, the second one wants more.

If we can go through with this sale before Christmas we would be stressed, but happy. If we can't then we will still try to go through with it but rent. It was hard enough to find a buyer before, I certainly don't want to try to find a market the way it is now.

Thanks

cherry_blossom_6

Anyone else?

cats!

Can you arrange to set a deadline with this buyer for exchange and completion? If he still stalls why don't you rent out the property for a while until you are sure about settling abroad??

You can always instruct another agent to sell if you're abroad. Can a trusted friend here in the UK help??

cherry_blossom_6

Thanks, we are sure about settling abroad. We have been trying to get to Australia for the last 9 years, but have only been in a position to for the last year.
We can't afford to go without having sold the house first so renting is out of the question. We wouldn't want to be tied to a country we don't see ourselves coming back to (we have lived in Oz before, so we know what we are letting ourselves in for).
I have spoken to another solicitor who has told us it would be possible, as long as our buyer and his solicitor pull their fingers out.

cats!

Hope it all works out ok!

I guess the only other option would be to contact one of the parasitic "we buy below market value" companies and accept a hit on the sale price?? Just a thought ...

lynzpower

why is your property so difficult to find a buyer for? the market has only just started really dipping, earlier in the year all over the country property was "flying off the shelves" certainly in the south east and also where i have freinds in some parts of the north.

Im wondering if we can think creatively about this problem.

Is it that its in a remote place? Or unusual layout etc ?

SquatNow

Try dropping the price!

Once you drop it low enough a cash buyer will turn up and have the whole process done in a few days. Then you'll have their cash and they will have a rapidly depreciating asset.

Remember: Your house is only worth what someone is prepared to pay for it, and, in the current market, what someone can get finance for. The person who you're selling to overestimated the properties value, as did you.

Either re-advertise at a lower price, say 20% off, or contact the buyer and find out how much his banks were prepared to lend him for the place. Ask him to send you copies of the docs. They'll tell you how much it's worth.

If you have to knock £10k or £20k off for this buyer so they can get a mortgage, it's better than the sale falling through. If you have to re-advertise you'll probably lose a lot more than £20k and could well end up chasing the market down.

If the buyer has been knocked back by 3 banks since Aaugust, then he's not going to suddenly find a bank that will lend to him now.

mr.broderick

SquatNow wrote: »

Try dropping the price!

Once you drop it low enough a cash buyer will turn up and have the whole process done in a few days. Then you'll have their cash and they will have a rapidly depreciating asset.

Remember: Your house is only worth what someone is prepared to pay for it, and, in the current market, what someone can get finance for. The person who you're selling to overestimated the properties value, as did you.

Either re-advertise at a lower price, say 20% off, or contact the buyer and find out how much his banks were prepared to lend him for the place. Ask him to send you copies of the docs. They'll tell you how much it's worth.

If you have to knock £10k or £20k off for this buyer so they can get a mortgage, it's better than the sale falling through. If you have to re-advertise you'll probably lose a lot more than £20k and could well end up chasing the market down.

If the buyer has been knocked back by 3 banks since Aaugust, then he's not going to suddenly find a bank that will lend to him now.

i actually agree with this post

Nicki

It is true that they won't exchange until the mortgage offer is through. Otherwise the buyer would be committed to proceed with the purchase but not be able to do so because he doesn't have the funds to do so. I understand why you need to complete by beginning February but why is it so imperative to exchange before Christmas other than for peace of mind?

If its your job you need to give notice for, then if you are leaving on 4 February, you have until 4 January to hand in your notice. Why do you need to have exchanged 3 weeks before this? In any event, even if you handed in your notice late and didn't work a full month, what is the absolute worst that could happen? You can't be compelled to work out all of your notice, and though you could theoretically be injuncted from starting a new job until your notice period expired to be honest this only usually happens with high flying businessmen and bankers, and wouldn't be binding on an overseas company anyway. Would your boss not be sympathetic if you explained the situation at this point and give you some leeway? If you have holiday entitlement unused you can deduct this from the one month you are required to give anyway, so perhaps working over the Christmas holiday would give you a bit more breathing space.

My main worry is that the buyer is flaky, and so I might at this point be marketing the property again to see if there is other interest just to keep options open. You don't have to tell your buyer you are doing so until you get to the point of accepting an alternative offer. I would certainly want proof of his mortgage offer. Usually these come through within about 10 days of all documentation being provided. If he can't supply you with proof (even just a confirmation from his broker) then alarm bells would ring.