Is there anything we can do?

[Deleted User]

Hi, I’ve posted a few times due to a lot of hiccups throughout my buying/selling experience! If you haven’t seen my previous threads, the short story is we’re selling to FTB and we’re buying a house that’s occupied by tenants, but the seller themselves has no onward chain. 

Anyway, my most recent post mentioned that we’d decided to pull out after our proposed completion date of this Friday (this dates been proposed since September) was requested to be pushed back into next year for various reasons elsewhere in the chain. Due to other problems we’ve had with another party in the chain, we just decided to walk away and start fresh as we had little belief things would go through. 

Having decided that, everyone agreed to the proposed dates again and all solicitors involved in the chains were all in agreement it was achievable (this was a couple of weeks ago) 

My question now is we still haven’t exchanged, and proposed completion is 3 days away, and the house we’re buying still isn’t vacant. Last week we were told their were a few tiny normal things to take care of and then we’d exchange, and completion was well on track, but nothing since. 

We’ve chased the EA and our solicitor to give us an update and help us understand the hold up and likelihood of it happening as planned (as we’ve booked removals and taken time off work etc.) and all we’ve been told now is things are difficult right now due to staff shortages and people are working as quickly as they can - So no mention of whether or not Friday is doable. 

Is this normal? Would anyone else be expecting something better? 

MaryNB

Deleted User said:

Hi, I’ve posted a few times due to a lot of hiccups throughout my buying/selling experience! If you haven’t seen my previous threads, the short story is we’re selling to FTB and we’re buying a house that’s occupied by tenants, but the seller themselves has no onward chain. 

Anyway, my most recent post mentioned that we’d decided to pull out after our proposed completion date of this Friday (this dates been proposed since September) was requested to be pushed back into next year for various reasons elsewhere in the chain. Due to other problems we’ve had with another party in the chain, we just decided to walk away and start fresh as we had little belief things would go through. 

Having decided that, everyone seemed to quickly revert to agreeing to the proposed dates again and all solicitors involved in the chains were all in agreement it was achievable (this was a couple of weeks ago) 

My question now is we still haven’t exchanged, and proposed completion is 3 days away, and the house we’re buying still isn’t vacant. Last week we were told their were a few tiny normal things to take care of and then we’d exchange, and completion was well on track, but nothing since. 

We’ve chased the EA and our solicitor to give us an update and help us understand the hold up and likelihood of it happening as planned (as we’ve booked removals and taken time off work etc.) and all we’ve been told now is things are difficult right now due to staff shortages and people are working as quickly as they can - So no mention of whether or not Friday is doable. 

Is this normal? Would anyone else be expecting something better? 

The discussions and agreements over completion dates and progress are irrelevant because

 the house we’re buying still isn’t vacant. 

What's the likelihood of it being empty in the next 3 days?

I wouldn't have got involved again with that property unless the tenants had moved out. Have you any idea when they will be moving out? As in evidence from the seller that the tenants have given in their notice or evidence that an eviction notice has been granted?

[Deleted User]

Our proposed exchange and completion dates were based on the dates they were due to vacate but we’ve not been told why this hasn’t happened or if it still will this week. 

MaryNB

Deleted User said:

Our proposed exchange and completion dates were based on the dates they were due to vacate but we’ve not been told why this hasn’t happened or if it still will this week. 

The problem with the tenants moving out is that they have no incentive at all to move out for you. What evidence do you have that they will actually move out? Did the tenants tell you they are due to move out or did the seller tell you? The seller will tell you what you want to hear so they keep you on board.

Most sellers need the money from the sale for their onward purchase, and even if they don't they still get a lot of money from completing on a property. The sale of the property has no significant impact on the tenant, unless the landlord is getting an eviction order in order to sell it. 

[Deleted User]

The tenants are buying a house themselves and our solicitor reached out to theirs to confirm they were due to vacate this week. Up until last week, it was all on track but it’s pure silence this week 

MaryNB

Unfortunately there's not really much you can do. Threatening to pull out or drop the price won't have any impact on the tenants like it would if the seller was delaying. The only thing that would do is put pressure on the seller to put pressure on the tenants. The tenants have nothing to lose if they don't move out - unless the seller is giving them a financial incentive to leave asap or if they've handed in their notice (although they'd be stupid to do so until they've exchanged on their own property).

GoogleMeNow

Your thread title "Is there anything we can do?"

Short answer is no.

If you are buying this property to live in and/or you are getting a residential mortgage, there will be absolutely no progress and no exchange until the property is vacant.

There is nothing you can do to facilitate this.

This is between the seller's solicitor, the seller and the tenants to progress. 

If the tenants are buying a property, then hopefully they will vacate sometime before the courts evict them.

Your transaction will only progress once the property is vacant and the sellers' can offer you vacant possession.  Once the property is vacant, you should go to view the property to ensure that the condition is as expected and you can confirm to your solicitor that you are happy to proceed.

[Deleted User]

GoogleMeNow said:

Your thread title "Is there anything we can do?"

Short answer is no.

If you are buying this property to live in and/or you are getting a residential mortgage, there will be absolutely no progress and no exchange until the property is vacant.

There is nothing you can do to facilitate this.

This is between the seller's solicitor, the seller and the tenants to progress. 

If the tenants are buying a property, then hopefully they will vacate sometime before the courts evict them.

Your transaction will only progress once the property is vacant and the sellers' can offer you vacant possession.  Once the property is vacant, you should go to view the property to ensure that the condition is as expected and you can confirm to your solicitor that you are happy to proceed.

Totally understand that, we’re actually booked in this week to view it because it was supposed to be empty and then we were to exchange and complete, which is why it’s just so frustrating that we’re days away and clearly not remotely in a position for any of this to happen and can’t help but feel more open and realistic comms from the EA and solicitors would have prevented the wrong expectations being set.

GoogleMeNow

Realistic communications are rare from EAs because they are not a party to the legal work, so don't really know what's going on once the file is in the hands of the solicitors.  The EA may have a sales progression person who chases up and down, but it's like Chinese whispers - without knowledge and evidence of what's happening, most of it is guesswork.

Solicitors do try to manage expectations and be realistic, but clients regularly do not take on board what they are being told and would rather take the advice of the EA, simply because the EA tells them what they want to hear.

eddddy

Deleted User said:

Totally understand that, we’re actually booked in this week to view it because it was supposed to be empty and then we were to exchange and complete, which is why it’s just so frustrating that we’re days away and clearly not remotely in a position for any of this to happen and can’t help but feel more open and realistic comms from the EA and solicitors would have prevented the wrong expectations being set.

The challenge is that you effectively have a chain above you that you probably know very little about.

It sounds like you cannot exchange contracts until the tenants exchange contracts, complete and move out.

But the tenants might have a long and messy chain above them.

It's good that your solicitor is trying to contact the tenant's solicitor to find out about their purchase/chain.

It would also be good if your EA (and your seller's EA) contacted the EAs in the tenant's chain, to get a better feel for how things are progressing.

[Deleted User]

Yes that’s exactly it. 

We had previously been told the same from the EA and the solicitors (That all parties in our chain and the one above were in agreement with these dates) but as I say we’re only a few days away now from everyone needing to exchange and complete to make it happen, and we’ve heard very little on progress.