OT: House buying/selling

Do you know why? In particular, is it for some reason the next buyer might also pull out, such as a mortgage being refused on the property?

"personal reasons" apparently.

He's been a bit of a dick since day one.

I feel as if a contract needs signing once an offer has been made tying the buyer to see it through where appropriate.

Yes, but I'm in Scotland :-) 5 weeks from viewing to moving, I think.

I am convinced the English(/Welsh) system exists solely to make money for s olicitors. After being told that completion would be delayed by a week less than 24 hours before the previously-agreed date, which had already dragged on for months longer than expected or reasonable I was self-medicating on Penguin biscuits.

When buying/selling in England it is important to realise there are two par ties to the transaction: (a) the buyer and the seller who jointly want ever ything to go quickly and smoothly; and (b) the solicitors who will happily exchange letters with each other at £400 an hour requesting informatio n from each other which was supplied months before.

Owain

Unfortunately many things can change - their buyer may have pulled out; a job that they were moving for may have fallen through; their hours or rate of pay may have been cut; one of them may have been diagnosed with an illness that is going to cuth their income; a couple may be splitting up or have found that they are expecting a baby and going to lose one income.

There are many reasonable reasons and, if they are personal ones, they may be very reluctant to reveal more.

SteveW

Exactly, and not just property sales.

Yes - this one in just under a month. I was a first time buyer with funds in place from a BS, the owner had another place to go to, and my solicitor was a good pal. Of course that was many years ago before computers slowed things down. ;-)

Yes 3 months would be quite long. It is important to remember that the sale takes place when the contract is signed. I would not want to buy a property without having it properly inspected by an agent I was paying. I have no desire to see the present system in England and Wales changed.

That was done at the beginning of the last century when the Land Registry was started with the intention of simplifying the process, which it has done by and large. If you have a willing and able buyer, a willing sellor and competent conveyancers the transaction can be done very quickly.

Most delays have nothing to do with the system and everything to do with the people involved. There may be a chain which noone is prepared to break, they may have lazy, incompetent conveyancers (the norm in my experience), if they want surveys and searches tere may be delays in gettung those

Because they can. When we tried to sell my parents house when they were in a care home someone wanted to buy it, but there were endless delays, apparently due to their solicitor being incompetent (couldn't understand maps showing property boundaries, didn't know how to do the first registration of a property). It took so long that my mother died before the sale at which they promptly withdrew.

A couple of months later, and I'd registered the property (it seemed obvious that all the local solicitors wouldn't have the ability to do it) the original prospective purchasers had the utter gall to make a new, lower offer! Needless to say they were told where to go.

Indeed!

My last move, which was happily over 30 years ago, was delayed by my buyer only revealing at the time exchange was due that some of the money was tied up overseas, and they didn't want to lose out by liberating it too soon.

Once that was sorted, at the other end of the chain, somebody on whose behalf a property was being sold died, and they had to wait for probate.

There was a week or two when if looked very tricky, but all eventually got sorted.

Chris

In message , R D S writes

Assuming we are talking viewing or initial offer day through to moving day, then no. Bought my first house, in Bristol, in 1975, and have bought eight properties in all, the most recent in Scotland. Never taken less than three months.

I bought this place in 6 weeks, but that was back in 1990

As someone has said 'because they can'. It costs a seller nothing to put th eir house on the market. The buyer has to appoint a solicitor, get surveys done etc racking up all of the costs only for the seller to change their mi nd and there is nothing to stop them from putting it back on the market aga in later.

This was going to be addressed by the Home Inspection Pack scheme which wou ld force the seller to pay for an independent survey when putting their hou se on the market. Unfortunately it all fell through.

I bought a flat off a mate - long time ago, but I think we managed it in a tad less than that (I had a simple mortgage to arrange, no Estate agent, solicitors doing the conveyancing and no chain).

We really need to bring bits of the Scottish system in to stop time wasters...

Tell me about it. It happened three times on our last sale.

1. Decided having a rear entry gate was unsafe for the children. Bloody well lock it then!
2. Decided a rendered exterior would need too much future maintenance. Then why offer to buy it in the first place!!
3. No comment!

All three held on right to the point of having to pay a deposit before pulling out.

We have just put our current house on the market, first viewing tomorrow. Wish me luck...

Mike

I remember my solicitor saying I had to be available for a phone call around 9am on the day of exchange (or was it completion, I forget now), to make sure I was still alive. She said, "Don't worry, I've only had one case where my client died on the day".

It was quite a long chain apparently, but it all completed by

I joined the chain late on when another buyer had pulled out, so it seemed quick to me, but some others had been in the chain for months.

First rule of house-moving - on the day of the move (which is almost always completion day), as you are packing everything, make sure you leave a telephone plugged in - or that you have good mobile reception and the estate agent knows you mobile number.

We were just finishing loading up our cars to set off to the new house when the new owner rather tentatively knocked at the door and said "are you ready yet - the estate agent has been trying to phone you for an hour".

Yes, we'd packed up all the landline phones:-( Mobile reception at our house was very patchy and didn't work too well downstairs. Also, I'm not convinced that the estate agent knew/used either of our mobile numbers.

wot no photo of t'air-raid shelter?

Owain