Exchange and Completion on the same day

J_Smotthies2021

Hi,
We had found a chain free property in December and agreed a price, got mortgage offers approved so on by the beginning of Feb this year. However, we suddenly learnt in Feb that the seller is not actually chain free and he was looking to by as well. Although not very happy, we waited since then and last week the sellers solicitor came back saying that they are ready and would like to exchange asap but completion is on 28th of June. Our mortgage offers ends on 30th of June, and in case this moves to 1st of July we will be paying extra 12.5 K stamp duty even we manage to extend the offer. My solicitor proposed to do both exchange and sale on the same day because he is worried that in case something goes wrong for whatever reason, we need to give 10 working days notice, and this will move to July - which means no mortgage offer and extra stamp duty so on. and the chain is not keen to do it. We are at the bottom of the chain so we are buying without selling and in case we do not buy chain will probably collapse.

I cam getting tons of calls and emails from various people including agent we are buying but also others on the chain and this is really making me stressed as we have been waiting for months and the only reason we started the process was that we have been told that they were chain free in December in order to catch the end of March deadline.

I am not sure what kind of guarantee we can give to the chain to make sure that this happens in some way but I am open for creative ideas without taking the risk of this moving to July.

thanks

Thrugelmir

Give no guarantees. As it's not your problem. You made your offer in good faith.  Play hard ball. 

K_S

J_Smotthies2021 As a chain-free buyer, same day exchange-completion doesn't hold too many risks for you but it may not be the same for others up the chain.

I personally hate it when "chain-free" vendors turn out to be anything but. It's much more common than you would expect unfortunately. Such a shame if you had to pay an extra 12.5k in spite of having been ready to buy for more than 6 months now.

J_Smotthies2021

I understand your point. If this moves beyond the end of June, we won't be buying anyway due to stamp duty being nearly 50K. 

J_Smotthies2021

meanwhile, just as a B-Plan, what we can really offer to the chain to resolve the issue - ie. can we say and formalize that we are happy to pay 1K of cancellation fees of the moving arrangements in case we do not buy on a specific date? or something similar. 

I am definitely upset with my seller, however the rest of the chain is not aware of these issues and they probably see this completely different. 

MWT

J_Smotthies2021 said:

I understand your point. If this moves beyond the end of June, we won't be buying anyway due to stamp duty being nearly 50K. 

If you really mean that, then as far as I can see, same day exchange and complete is the only safe option for you at this point.

It isn't your fault that you've ended up here, that is down to your buyer so any problem up the chain are theirs to resolve not yours.

lonibra

OP, you don't owe the chain anything, especially one that's originated only because your seller lied to you. It's dog eat dog in the house buying process, just think about yourself.

J_Smotthies2021

it seems taht my seller is behaving again so weird and want to be completely risk free in a chain - I am not sure how this can technically happen? Someone in the middle of the chain, there is always a risk of completing the sale but failing to buy right ?

user1977

J_Smotthies2021 said:

Someone in the middle of the chain, there is always a risk of completing the sale but failing to buy right ?

Not really, no.

J_Smotthies2021

Lets assume that I am in the middle of the chain, and I soled my property and my solicitor got all the monies. However, my seller suddenly changed his mind and wants to send my deposit back to me. So, I already sold but did not buy, right?

Alter_ego

J_Smotthies2021 said:

Lets assume that I am in the middle of the chain, and I soled my property and my solicitor got all the monies. However, my seller suddenly changed his mind and wants to send my deposit back to me. So, I already sold but did not buy, right?

No not right