How long is your sale taking?

dunmuvin

I wonder what has changed in the seven years since I last moved house?  

I thought that with so much more online it would be quicker.  

I’ve moved house a lot and the last purchase took 8 weeks from first viewing to completion.  My previous sale a year earlier took 10 weeks.  

I’ve always sold and moved into a rental and never been in a long chain.  Have I just been lucky? 

I was surprised this time when the solictor said 12-16 weeks from offer accepted to exchange, given that it’s a cash buyer and I’m moving into a rental,  but here we are 12 weeks later!  

I took my signed contract to the solicitors two weeks ago.  Apparently now we’re waiting for the buyers solicitor to confirm they have no further enquiries.  I thought all enquiries were dealt with before contracts were exchanged. 

The whole process is so opaque.  

sheramber

Presumably contracts have not been exchanged if there still outstanding enquiries.
 

Because you handed in a signed contract doesn’t mean the solicitors have exchanged them.
 It will sitting in your file until everyone is ready to exchange. 

dunmuvin

I thought all outstanding enquiries were resolved before contracts were drawn up.  Ah well.  

Albermarle

I wonder what has changed in the seven years since I last moved house?  

The solicitors will be more on the ball regarding money laundering checks, and will ask for more evidence/history of the source of any cash. A few seem to take it to extremes from some posts seen on the forum.

esubbs

Too long 😔 

dunmuvin

I had a chat to my solicitor.  As Sheramber said they now like to get contracts signed and ready to go until all enquiries are completed.  It means they’re not trying to do that last minute.  Also now they set a date for completion and work back an exchange date.  And the gap between exchange and completion is a lot less.  It’s now more likely to be a week or two than four weeks. 

artyboy

A lot more is done online now - I have a WhatsApp group chat with my vendor's EA, and I know the solicitors are messaging via email.

But while that helps with communications and transparency, it doesn't help when you are dependent on information coming from other parties with no skin in the game, like freeholders, managing agents, councils etc. There you are entirely dependent on their own SLAs, goodwill etc, and it can sometimes feel like things have fallen into a black hole.

At least having a decent conveyancer and EA helps, because they can explain the process and manage expectations along the way.

Bossypants

We've just completed, it took 16 weeks all told, freehold properyy which with no chain on either side and only minor niggly complications was quite a shock! Last time I moved the same sort of transaction was generally done in 8-10 weeks. Still we got there in the end!