Finally got my mortgage offer...what now?

If everything's sorted, you should obviously be pretty much there and ready to exchange. In my experience, there'll still be a lot of loose ends to tie up. We had our mortgage offer within a month, but it took another four months to exchange (don't worry, there were unforeseen problems with our purchase!). If you really are 'all done', the solicitors will call you in to sign papers ready for exchange. They won't actually exchange until all parties have agred on a completion date.

Once you exchange, your completion date is set so you can inform services and book removals, etc. That's why it's wise not to exchange and complete on the same day (I've done it, it was a nightmare). Generally, it's a week or two inbetween, but some still want a month.

My removal men were there around 8am. Depends on the size of what you're packing up, I suppose.

On average, it's around 12 weeks from offer to completion. Obviously an average is made up of some taking far less, others far longer, so take that with a pinch of salt. As said, our last one took five months start to finish, but I have done it all in four weeks before.

Are all the searches back? Are all properties in the chain freehold? Leasehold can slow things down a bit.

Generally, people start clearing out their properties the morning of completion (obviously packing will be done before that). You'll all in theory be in around midday, or at least officially own the property then. Never been in at midday in my life though, and my last one was more like 3-4pm by the time we got the call saying it had completed.

Good luck.

Jx