Sellers Solicitor Not Responding

sunflower1980

So myself and my partner sold our house and then finally found a house we love and had our offer accepted 5 months ago. It’s a 3 link chain. 

Because of coronavirus, Christmas and New Years, everything has moved slowly.

We are now in a position where we are trying to agree to a completion date. Our buyer and ourselves have agreed to a date but it’s been 2 and a half weeks and we have not had a response from our sellers solicitor!

Our sellers solicitor has really bad reviews online and he will not respond to any communication from our solicitor, the estate agent, or even the sellers themselves! The estate agent has chased but has said she doesn’t want to get involved with dates..and my solicitor has chased every other day but has now said that we just have to wait. It’s now 3 weeks until the unconfirmed date and our mortgage runs out next month.

I do not have contact details for my seller or I would ring myself and ask them if the date is okay or ask what’s going on.

What can I do now? It’s draining us mentally and emotionally not knowing what’s going on or if it will go ahead..

Grateful for any suggestions.

davidmcn

If the estate agent is talking to you then continue to hassle them (within reason). They'll want the transaction completed almost as much as you do.

Suseka97

sunflower1980 said:

............The estate agent has chased but has said she doesn’t want to get involved with dates..and my solicitor has chased every other day but has now said that we just have to wait. It’s now 3 weeks until the unconfirmed date and our mortgage runs out next month.

Interesting lack of motivation by the EA and I'd be getting onto them to insist they take more of an active role in getting this across the line.  Our EA's sales progression team are the ones liaising up and down the chain, keeping on top of solicitors and have got us to the point of exchange.

sunflower1980

Tell me about it. The estate agent has decided that she “doesn’t want to get involved with discussing completion dates and this should be done through the solicitors”

HampshireH

sunflower1980 said:

Tell me about it. The estate agent has decided that she “doesn’t want to get involved with discussing completion dates and this should be done through the solicitors”

She might if you tell her there won't be a completion date if the sellers (their client) don't get their act together.

I

m0bov

Give a deadline. Maybe view other properties. Pop a note in the letterbox?

Thrugelmir

What are the plans of the party at the top of the chain?  This is going to dictate events. 

maxsteam

I agree to the idea of giving a deadline, if you can stick to it. Personally I don't like the idea of chains and I would try hard to avoid one. If you give a deadline, you should have an alternative plan in case the seller doesn't sell. A delay of two and a half weeks is not long considering it's taken 5 months to get to the stage of discussing completion dates. You should not panic about the "mortgage running out" but, if you give the lender a call, they will tell you exactly what will happen when it "runs out" and I am sure that it won't be anything unpleasant. Having said that, it would not be unreasonable to tell your solicitor to tell the seller's solicitor that you need to agree a completion date that is sometime before the end of April otherwise you will pull out, but only say this if you can stick to it. You should be wary about sending too many angry messages.

It's important that you have a little flexibility. It's not a situation where two people can vote for one date and expect the third person to accept the majority view.

Seashell517

sunflower1980 said:

So myself and my partner sold our house and then finally found a house we love and had our offer accepted 5 months ago. It’s a 3 link chain. 

Because of coronavirus, Christmas and New Years, everything has moved slowly.

We are now in a position where we are trying to agree to a completion date. Our buyer and ourselves have agreed to a date but it’s been 2 and a half weeks and we have not had a response from our sellers solicitor!

Our sellers solicitor has really bad reviews online and he will not respond to any communication from our solicitor, the estate agent, or even the sellers themselves! The estate agent has chased but has said she doesn’t want to get involved with dates..and my solicitor has chased every other day but has now said that we just have to wait. It’s now 3 weeks until the unconfirmed date and our mortgage runs out next month.

I do not have contact details for my seller or I would ring myself and ask them if the date is okay or ask what’s going on.

What can I do now? It’s draining us mentally and emotionally not knowing what’s going on or if it will go ahead..

Grateful for any suggestions.

If the vendor genuinely hasn't had any communication from their solicitor then they need to escalate that to the solicitor's manager. It could be that the solicitor is off or out sick, but I would be looking to first make contact with someone else at the firm (ring a general phone number / email an general email address) and if the solicitor is present and still not responding, then first speak to manager and if that doesn't help then make a complaint.