Buying property with court order

CAM102963

Has anyone been through/or know anything about the process/timelines involved when buying a property with court order?

Exchange is taking longer than expected as we’ve been told the court needs to counter-sign the contract (the court order is in place I believe due to divorced sellers)

propertyrental

If you read this forum regularly you'll see examples where one party refuses to accept the price agreed and can drag out the process.

No idea how long courts take just to counter-sign, but I'd be prepared for delays if I were you.

I'd also insist on a viewing the day before Exchange......

macman

What sort of 'court order'? A forced sale due to divorce is always likely to take longer, as both parties will be trying to maximise their share of the proceeds, but, since your conveyancer won't allow you to proceed to exchange until good title is established, there's no greater risk involved.
The major obstacle will be if one of the parties is still in the property and is unwilling to vacate: again, your conveyancer should not allow you to exchange without vacant possession.  I suppose the worst possible scenario, from your perspective anyway, would be if they had a reconciliation...

eddddy

macman said:

... again, your conveyancer should not allow you to exchange without vacant possession. 

Obviously the OP will be buying the property with vacant possession, but it's unlikely that the property will be vacant at exchange of contracts. 

One or both divorcing parties are likely to be living there. Otherwise they'd potentially have nowhere to live between exchange and completion.

And even if it is vacant, presumably the owners will have keys to get back in, if they want.



As with most house sales, the owners will probably need the completion funds to buy their next 2 houses.

Or if they're both going into rentals, they'll probably want contracts exchanged before they sign ASTs and move.

(Although, if the relationship is really bad, sometimes one party might have moved out to stay with friends or family - while the sale goes through.)

CAM102963

Thanks all - both have vacated the property and now live abroad! Just now sure how long this counter sign process with the courts takes and not getting any sense of timelines at all from agents/solicitors 

DullGreyGuy

The issue my mother had on her last purchase was the court/charge order plus outstanding mortgage was notably above the agreed sale price for the property. Took a while for it to be dealt with to ensure the property would be unencumbered when she purchased it.

Titus_Wadd

Even where there's negative equity for the divorcing couple to clear the solicitors would not be ready to complete without the additional funds to clear the mortgage, it might take longer.  Vendors overseas might slow things down but if both ex-spouses support the sale it shouldn't take too long...results may vary.