Should I request a completion deadline

Grt87

Hi, first time seller here!

We have agreed the sale of our house and have had an offer accepted on one we'd like to purchase. Happy days!

The seller of our new property is moving in to a new build, due to be completed in June. However, as part of the sale we have been asked to agree to exchange contracts within 49 days.

I don't have any particular objection to doing this, but wondered if I should insist on a completion deadline (eg. mid July) to ensure that any delays in the construction of the seller's new property don't come back to bite me, post exchange of contracts.

I'm also wondering if I should request the same 49 day exchange from my buyer (the buyer is a first time buyer and happy to wait until June)

Can't get a straight answer from the solicitors or estate agents, so thought I would ask this community. Any advice would be much appreciated.

Cheers!

loubel

A new build in a chain is a nightmare and you would be very sensible to insist on a fixed completion date or a long-stop date that suits you (rather than matching what your seller will be asked to agree to on their purchase).

 The seller needs to be prepared to break the chain and complete the sale to you before their new build is ready if the build is delayed beyond what you are prepared to wait.

theartfullodger

Anyone got any independent statistics on how reliable developers completion dates are?? I know what I'd expect.....

Albermarle

theartfullodger said:

Anyone got any independent statistics on reliable developers dates are?? I know what I'd expect.....

My SIL was in this position, with a delay in the new build being ready. Then even when it was ready the developer did not want to complete for another 8 weeks, due to some mysterious financial issue.
Luckily her buyers were not desperate, and she managed to keep them on board.

NameUnavailable

Your problem is if something changes in your personal circumstances between exchange and completion which might affect your ability to continue with the purchase.

Someone else here posted about having lost their job after exchanging and waiting for their vendors (new build) to be ready to complete. Mortgage offer gets pulled but they are committed to proceeding or losing a LOT of money.

I would be wary unless you're totally confident you can proceed whatever happens.

eddddy

Grt87 said:

I'm also wondering if I should request the same 49 day exchange from my buyer (the buyer is a first time buyer and happy to wait until June)

Realistically, you have to do that. You don't really have a choice.

When you exchange contracts on your purchase - in 49 days time or less - you become committed to purchase.

If you haven't exchanged contracts with your buyer at the same time, your buyer might walk away for some reason - maybe on day 50, or day 51, or day 60 etc.

You'll then be committed to purchase a new property, and potentially unable to sell your current property.


(Unless you have enough cash to buy the new property, without selling your current property.)

anselld

Exchange in 49 days is not the main problem.  The problem is that newbuild are normally "completion on notice", ie there is not a fixed completion date at the point of exchange as there would be in "normal" transactions.  That makes a chain with a newbuild at the top virtually unmanageable unless the buyer of the newbuild is prepared to use temporary accomodation.

taylor86

I have been through similar but I am the buyer of the new build and there was a chain behind me. We were given an 8 week deadline to exchange and all the chain would have to exchange together. The estate agent told us there’s not a chance that would happen and to just go along with it to keep the developer happy. As it turns out there were hiccups in the chain, lost a buyer and remarketed etc and have finally exchanged after about 4.5 months. 

Builder was happy as they could see progress albeit slowly.

Completion is still a few months away and the build is on track and we’ve now negotiated a fixed completion date to keep us and everyone in the chain happy. 

The completion date is the date they gave us when the foundations were being layed. No delays so far.

Grt87

Thanks all, really useful advice. I've instructed our solicitor to request a completion deadline based on this discussion. Fingers crossed all goes well!! Cheers