Same day house sale and completion that failed.... What next?

london21

Sorry you had to go through that stress and it not working out.
Same day exchange/completion very risky especially when buyer or seller are in chain.
Might need to find another buyer.

canaldumidi

Rictoven said:

.....
We have always made it clear during this sale that my wife and I did not want a same day exchange and completion and especially on a Friday as banks close early. 
....

You were very sensible to not want to exchange/Complete on the same day, for reasons which later became evident.

Wise also to avoid Fridays, though not for the reason you give!

Easy to be wise after the event but you should have stuck to your guns (and as others have said, the decision should be based on your preference, and your solicitor's advice, not the estate agent).

Scotbot

canaldumidi said:

Rictoven said:

.....
We have always made it clear during this sale that my wife and I did not want a same day exchange and completion and especially on a Friday as banks close early. 
....

You were very sensible to not want to exchange/Complete on the same day, for reasons which later became evident.

Wise also to avoid Fridays, though not for the reason you give!

Easy to be wise after the event but you should have stuck to your guns (and as others have said, the decision should be based on your preference, and your solicitor's advice, not the estate agent).

A couple in their 60s who  probably haven't sold a house in the last 20 years and are not used to making large financial transactions.I am not surprised they were unfamiliar with the legalities and tecnnical issues.

For anyone else reading this never exchange and complete on the same day. Exchanges regularly fail to take place as scheduled. It's  your choice not the solicitors or EA. If they say otherwise remind them you are paying them so you make the decision

I hope it works out next time

user1977

Scotbot said:

canaldumidi said:

Rictoven said:

.....
We have always made it clear during this sale that my wife and I did not want a same day exchange and completion and especially on a Friday as banks close early. 
....

You were very sensible to not want to exchange/Complete on the same day, for reasons which later became evident.

Wise also to avoid Fridays, though not for the reason you give!

Easy to be wise after the event but you should have stuck to your guns (and as others have said, the decision should be based on your preference, and your solicitor's advice, not the estate agent).

For anyone else reading this never exchange and complete on the same day.

Well, not if it involves packing your life into a removal van. If you're selling something which is already vacant, or don't mind exactly what date you get the keys for your new place, it's much less of an issue.

verytired11

aSo sorry this happened to you - what a nightmare.  EAs will say anything to get their money and they don't mind you wasting yours to that end.  Sadly, I don't think there is anyone you can recover some money from.  Did anyone else in the chain incur unnecessary costs?

TripleH

We exchanged and completed on the same day (England). But we were buying a new build property and were moving from rental. The original developer had gone bust and the new one was wanting to clear the remaining unsold properties on the development ASAP. In very short chains such as ours it can work, but the longer the chain the greater the risk someone, somewhere is a little slow on the ball or rhe greater the risk of confusion.

MrsBrush

I flatly refused a same day exchange and completion, which seemed to be the preference of a couple of the conveyancers in the chain (both cheap and nasty firms selected by my buyer and my vendor). My solicitor also agreed we needed to get exchange over the line first and advised me to not bow to (the significant) pressure from these two conveyancing cowboy outfits because these so often go wrong where a chain is involved as it could be a huge financial risk for us if things didn't go to plan, as the poor OP has found out to his financial and emotional cost. There is no comeback at all, a simultaneous transaction is totally at your own risk as there is not contract.

We had 8 attempts at exchange before the 9th attempt was finally successful. We had to move the completion date once because one of them was not remotely organised and seemingly relying on everyone else's teams to do their job for them. This unprofessional company finally decided on attempt 5 that their clients ID paperwork wasn't correct, and the rest of the time was just radio silence and no responses!!

My fabulous local solicitor just raised an eyebrow and chose not to comment when I said that I thought the factory conveyancers would do anything to mitigate their own risks, so they didn't need to take any financial or legal responsibilities when things go wrong. Said it all for me!

peterhjohnson

MrsBrush said:

We had 8 attempts at exchange before the 9th attempt was finally successful. 

Yes! I only had one failed exchange attempt on my recent move and we just tried again next day. I'm so glad it was before the fashion for simultaneous exchanges and completions!