I may now finally be getting close to selling my property.
If the buyer does decide to buy the property, what is the usual process?
Does he:
- write a letter to my estate agent, stating the offer?
- just phone the agent?
- do I formally accept the offer in writing?
- or verbally?
- subject to survey?
How rigorously will my estate agent be able to check whether it is indeed a very short chain and that the buyer's buyer is a first-time buyer and is genuinely committed?
Your estate agent will write to both of you confirming the offer/acceptance.
You and the buyer both appoint solicitors who will do their utmost to ensure either the deal doesn't go through or takes the maximum possible length of time, plus 35%.
The buyer will arrange a survey, the results of which he won't show you but will claim they make such bad reading that he's pulling out or wants a huge reduction of the purchase price.
You decline, or accept, this reduction according to how easily you think you can sell your house to someone else or if you think he's just trying it on.
Congrats, (I hope). I read somewhere this week that "the housing market traditionally picks up in September". you might have just been unfortunate in having your property on the market for this lenght of time at just the wrong time of year.
Well, when I bought this place (4yrs ago) it was all verbal. For the seller, your agent might write to you formally notifying you of the offer, but I doubt it.
There's no point in it being anything other than verbal - it's NOT binding upon either party. There are very specific legal requirements for contracts for a sale of land and anything else just muddies the water and is probably unenforceable.
Your agent should change their advertising to "Sold, Subject to Contract", and you may do well to keep the property on the market until such time as contracts have exchanged - there's no deception or deceit involved in this, you're just hedging against the potential buyer playing silly b***ers or just genuinely falling through. It's fair play and honourable to disclose this to the buyer and other interested potential buyers though.
And then the fun really starts.....
Anything before contract exchange will be subject to survey. If the buyer needs to raise finance (and most do) then the mortgage company will certainly need a valuation survey carrying out. The buyer might also have a survey carried out, and if this raises issues that were not pointed out in the sales process then expect them to come back looking for reduction in purchase price. Searches need to be carried out. Solicitors for both parties need to exchange various details and checklists. Be aware that Solicitors can move in geological timescales....
If you're lucky, the buyer might have agreed the finance in principle beforehand. If I were buying again I'd probably do this, and would have no problems in showing the agent this letter of agreement to prove my serious intentions.
I don't think that there is much that you can do to guarantee that the buyer isn't actually in the middle of a chain, but Mr Faulkner may be along with experience from the agent's point of view....
================ You could try putting an informal 'cash back' clause in the vendor details. On one occasion I offered £1500-00 cash back for completion in 6 weeks. The deal was done comfortably within the 6 weeks and the buyer received his 'cash back'. On another occasion I accepted an offer lower than my asking price subject to completion in 6 weeks. The buyers accepted my condition but tried to drag their feet. A week before the proposed completion date I got my solicitor to remind the buyers that I would not complete with them at the agreed price unless they could complete within the agreed timescale. There was a flurry of activity from the buyers and the deal was completed on time.
The moral is that the buyer isn't always in the driving seat. Once they've spent money on surveys etc. they're under as much pressure as you and working to an agreed timescale is one way of ensuring that your buyer is serious.
Another bit missing ... The official offer is for only 90% of the amount required for mortgage ... "the house is only worth that much" ...!
10.1 Much wailing and gnashing of teeth ...
10.2 Estate Agent manages to get mortgage provider to offer the missing ten percent of the loan provided a one-off premium insurance policy is effected to cover the difference between what you require and what the surveyer values the house at. If you offer to increase the deposit or the price is lowered step 10 through 10.2 will be repeated.
10.3 You say you can't afford the one-off premium for this insurance; You're stretched to the limit - and your first born is on eBay-
10.4 Estate Agent/Insurance saleman says;- that's OK we'll add it on to the amount borrowed - You'll hardly notice the extra monthly cost!
10.5 You acquiese, Estate Agent/Salesman pockets his commission.
Completion in six weeks seems incredibly optimistic! Is this realistic at the current time? People are always insinuating (in this thread, for example) that it's going to take weeks and weeks just to get to exchange of contracts, let alone completion.
============= It's certainly realistic if people do their preparation in advance of window shopping and making offers. If people get their finances sorted out in principle they should know what they can afford and what they can't. Of course, the dreaded 'chain' is the worst part of the equation. Searches can usually be completed very quickly and most other bits of the process can be speeded up if there's a will.
I don't know if it's a record but I once saw an empty house which I liked. I looked at it on Monday afternoon, decided I wanted it and instructed my solicitor the same day. The price was agreed, all searches were done in about two days and I paid by cash on the Friday of the same week. Less than five days from first viewing to completion. I wouldn't expect that this could be emulated in every case but it does suggest that we allow house buying in general to take far too long.
He will offer verbally or in writing, untill he does a survey, don't get excited. The estate agent is on commission so will tell you anything to get any sale at any price, so be warey of the estate agent.
You can always accept an offer subjet to completion in 12 or less weeks, or knock a grand off for a completeion in under 12 weeks, which is what I did. If you do thi don't drag it out, else people will get very upset with you.
A day to avoid completion if possible is a Friday. Solicitors tend to go AWOL, Banks are trying a POETS day And if theirs a c*ck-up with a single wire transfer in a chain, you will have X number of people sitting in vans with all their belongings and nowhere to go for a weekend.
but the last bit is the crucial bit really - and I'd guess most purchases involve a chain - and of course there are innumerable ways in which this can bugger up things.
We completed the purchase of this house in about 8 weeks, maybe a bit less actually as there was a bit of tooing and froing with another buyer as well., and that included the Xmas break, so that's a week or two out of the equation. We certainly didn't get the surveyors report back till after xmas, we had a builder look at a couple of things for us after that as well, ISTR it was about 2 weeks from exchange of contracts to completion.
But we were first time buyers, the house was empty and not part of a chain
On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 15:26:33 +0100, a particular chimpanzee named "Neil Jones" randomly hit the keyboard and produced:
..And give them your expected date of moving. They will all tell you that they are fully booked on that date, and they have a day free three weeks next Wednesday. IME.
I've actually tended to complete on Saturdays, which was a surprise as it was (a) convenient and (b) the lawyers/mortgage company was avaiable. Then, I'm one of these types who can't be bothered with chains. My first purchase had a long chain and I'm never going through that again. I sold that house to a first time buyer, moved into my parents for a month and then moved into another house with vacant possession. More hassle with the moving and storage, but considerably less with the legal processes.
=============== The 'six weeks' being suggested here is the total time between original offer and final signing. This timescale can be achieved ( I've done so twice in the past 11 years) provided that conditions are right and the inducements I offered certainly concentrated minds.
Fixed price conveyancing is a must. Your solicitors can be anywhere in the country, and one or two letters is all that is normally required. Browns Solicitors in Aylesbury do online quotes and, in my case, were very efficient.
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