House sale / purchase not going to plan

Ribosome

We put our house up for sale in January and it went in a week. The problem is it's a leasehold and now the buyers solicitor still hasn't received the LPE1 form from the management company, potentially holding up the sale and scaring the buyer off.

In the meantime we've offered on a house and two months later the vendor still hasn't found somewhere to move to. We've had a great mortgage offer, before the interest rate rise, which runs out in July.

We stupidly instructed our solicitor to carry out searches, they're in action so that money is gone.

Not sure whether to just ride it out or cut our losses and just stay where we are. We're financially committed now so might as well ride it out. 

More of a moan really. Should it take this long? 

Thrugelmir

Leasehold transaction do take longer. People finding somewhere else to buy can be a frustrating process. Now it's spring the volume of property for sale should pick up. 

Ribosome

I supposes I'm just after reassurance really. I spoke to the solicitor this morning and the management company, both told me different things about time emails have been sent / received. Really, really frustrating. 

eddddy

Ribosome said:

The problem is it's a leasehold and now the buyers solicitor still hasn't received the LPE1 form from the management company, potentially holding up the sale and scaring the buyer off.

So you're selling a leasehold house.

What would normally happen is your solicitor will ask your management company how much they charge for completing the LPE1.

Then your solicitor would request the LPE1 and send the fee. When your solicitor gets the LPE1, they forward it your buyer's solicitor.

So how far has your solicitor got with this process?


Solicitors aren't very good at hassling people and chasing things up - so maybe you should. If your solicitor says they've sent the request and the fee, try phoning the management company to see what's happening.

• Does the management company agree that they've received the request and the fee from your solicitor?
• Is somebody working on the LPE1?
• When do they expect to have the LPE1 finished?
• (Or, for example, do they say they've done it and already sent it back to your solicitor?)

Edit to add...
I just read your later comment... it sounds like you are chasing people.

What is each party saying?

Ribosome

Hi edddy, I've literally just done all you suggested after making this post. 

The solicitors secretary told me they sent the request to the management company in early March. The management company have told me they only received the request last week, 31st March. They also told me the solicitor sent the request to the exact person I told them NOT to send it to due to a previous bad experience.

So someone is telling big fat fibs. I've got onto our estate agent, as they recommended the solicitor, to chase them up. It's not good enough. 

Sistergold

I know many say do t do searches until abc has happened for me the time saved to just go ahead with searches is worth the possible loss of loading the money if the purchase should not go through. So if I were you I would not regret money spent. It’s only a few hundreds in the grand scheme of buying a house. 

Staying put, well it’s not fair for the management company to not act reasonably as to be honest you have a right to sell when you want to? Why not ask your solicitor to give an ultimatum of “as we have been waiting for x and it’s now b my client will need to sue for h as they have not acted in good faith or caused undue k”. Sorry just ask solicitors to force the management company of leaseholder to do their job really. 

AFF8879

Ribosome said:

Hi edddy, I've literally just done all you suggested after making this post. 

The solicitors secretary told me they sent the request to the management company in early March. The management company have told me they only received the request last week, 31st March. They also told me the solicitor sent the request to the exact person I told them NOT to send it to due to a previous bad experience.

So someone is telling big fat fibs. I've got onto our estate agent, as they recommended the solicitor, to chase them up. It's not good enough. 

Generally it’s not advisable to use any solicitor recommended by EA/developer/etc… they earn their fees through EA recommendations hence in order to keep this relationship sweet are less likely to be fully/solely devoted to your best interests in the event of any conflicts etc.

Ribosome

AFF8879 said:

Ribosome said:

Hi edddy, I've literally just done all you suggested after making this post. 

The solicitors secretary told me they sent the request to the management company in early March. The management company have told me they only received the request last week, 31st March. They also told me the solicitor sent the request to the exact person I told them NOT to send it to due to a previous bad experience.

So someone is telling big fat fibs. I've got onto our estate agent, as they recommended the solicitor, to chase them up. It's not good enough. 

Generally it’s not advisable to use any solicitor recommended by EA/developer/etc… they earn their fees through EA recommendations hence in order to keep this relationship sweet are less likely to be fully/solely devoted to your best interests in the event of any conflicts etc.

Aye, we dropped the ball on that. We're just going to have to let this run it's course. Either we move or we don't. 

onylon

Try to keep calm and work through the problem. My conveyancer did the exact same thing as yours and it wasn't the thing that slowed the transaction down. 

Between me and some great staff at the management company, it took about three weeks to get the management pack and answer all the enquiries that came from it. My conveyancer didn't even read the documents we sent her, just blindly forwarded everything on.

GoogleMeNow

onylon said:

My conveyancer didn't even read the documents we sent her, just blindly forwarded everything on.

It is the responsibility of a buyer's solicitor to read the documents and raise enquiries on anything revealed.  The seller's solicitor doesn't read the documents until the buyer's solicitor makes reference to anything contained within them that they want clarified.  Perfectly normal.

Ribosome

Thanks everyone. OK, so I've had an update from our vendors estate agent that they've low offered on yet another house and lost the purchase. 

In the mean time we've found a no chain "doer-upper" in a desirable area. Unfortunately we've already authorised searches on the other house. Can we transfer the searches? Would have to pay twice?