Sale Agreed - How long to close?

Shefwedfan

Looking for some info, so I have sold my house. Just gone sale agreed with buyer today. The buyer say they have mortgage approved etc and ready to move in ASAP. They don't have house to sell or anything

I asked the estate agent and he says it could be 12 weeks before close.

I have a house I want to buy but the seller will not accept our bid if anything is based on selling my own house. I have mortgage approved but it mentions in paper work the mortgage is based on selling my own house.

Just wondering does it really take 12 weeks to close? or if I push solicitors etc could I get it quicker. I really don't want to lose the new house....

hickory

I sold a house to a cash buyer and it did take about 10/11 weeks. We had already moved out of the house but it took 5 weeks for the bank to release the deeds and even at that my sister was able to put pressure to get them in that time as she had a contact in bank. Solicitors really didn't do much until they received these. Not sure really what took the time after that, think it was land searches/planning checks etc but we were amazed given both sides were ready to go

Shefwedfan

Thanks, I was in process of moving mortgage when we decided to sell so my solicitor already has the deeds, I guess this would speed up process?

Ursus Horribilis

I'm afraid it's a "how long is a piece of string?" question. I got the keys for my place 2 months after we went sale agreed. It could've gone through more quickly but for two issues. Something to do with probate (house went on the market after the owner died) and the bank being slow at sending paperwork on to the solicitor/releasing the cheque.

athtrasna

My former housemate went offer to keys in 13 days last year. No bank involved on either side though

jeamimus

athtrasna wrote: »

My former housemate went offer to keys in 13 days last year. No bank involved on either side though

Thats about the tops if you have two solicitors who are on the ball.

The typical time quoted is six to eight weeks.

Remember that nobody else is treating this as an urgency except yourselves.

For example vendors solicitor will propose a contract with irrelevant parts in it such as vat for second hand houses. The purchasers solicitor will take umbrage at this and demand it be removed (by snailmail too). After a week or two they will report a 'win' to you. All just a dance, wasting time and giving the impression of fighting for your interests.

Quandary

Once both solicitors are on the ball, the house is a registered property with no planning issues, no tenants involved, no mortgages involved on either side, both buyer and seller genuinely want to close the sale asap...

Then you might be able to close a sale within a month but that is the exception. Usually you are looking at 3 months give or take.

We have been sale agreed almost 7 months now and have been desperate to close. We're not involved in a chain, have mortgage approval for a very small mortgage and our solicitor is one of my best friends who has been doing all in his power to get the sale closed but the vendors side have been evasive and difficult at every turn. Vendors solicitor is dodging calls, the vendor is apparently very difficult to contact. They have refused to send very basic and commonly sought documentation relating to planning compliance and declaration of identity just to name a few.

Our mortgage approval is now on the cusp of expiring so we will have to go through the applying process again because of all the delays.

The only reason we have stayed in it so long is because we are getting a great house at a very good price but we have now reached the point where we cannot afford to wait longer. Our solicitor has given the vendors solicitor a 2 week deadline to provide the missing documentation or we are withdrawing from the sale and sending the contracts back.

long story short, don't buy a house in negative equity from a disgruntled seller :mad:

Hope you get your sale closed quick OP, best of luck!

jeamimus

Quandary wrote: »

Our solicitor has given the vendors solicitor a 2 week deadline to provide the missing documentation or we are withdrawing from the sale and sending the contracts back.

long story short, don't buy a house in negative equity from a disgruntled seller :mad:

Houses such as this may never have actually been 'for sale'.

Do you have signed contracts in your posession? If so, you can force the sale... for the sale price less all your legal costs and costs of any damages to make house comply with the terms of the contract. It will take years of course, but might turn out to be a good investment in the long term.

If you dont yet have signed contracts after 7 months, then forget it.

Quandary

jeamimus wrote: »

If you dont yet have signed contracts after 7 months, then forget it.

They want us to sign despite not providing crucial documentation. Our solicitor has advised us thst it would be madness.

To be honest the whole process with this property has been excessively difficult so far and if it wasn't for my wife being so attached to the house(despite me begging her not to form an emotional attachment to a property ), I would have pulled out 4 months ago. Thankfully, she has now finally realised she needs to let it go.

Capet

Hi quandry. I think we might be in a similar position. Sale agreed nearly three months. Found out after going sale agreed that vendor is waiting to get consent to sell from bank. No idea how long that could take. Apparently they want to sell the house and it shouldn't take much longer to get contracts but who knows.
So we are nearly three months after going sale agreed and no progress whatsoever. They didn't disclose prior to going sale agreed that it was a negative equity sale. Very frustrating

Quandary

Capet wrote: »

Hi quandry. I think we might be in a similar position. Sale agreed nearly three months. Found out after going sale agreed that vendor is waiting to get consent to sell from bank. No idea how long that could take. Apparently they want to sell the house and it shouldn't take much longer to get contracts but who knows.
So we are nearly three months after going sale agreed and no progress whatsoever. They didn't disclose prior to going sale agreed that it was a negative equity sale. Very frustrating

You are exactly where we were nearly 4 months ago. We weren't made aware of the negative equity situation, despite me asking the auctioneer to confirm this. They literally lied to us about this. In hindsight we should have pulled out at this point.

Hope your situation works out better than ours.

jeamimus

Quandary wrote: »

They want us to sign despite not providing crucial documentation. Our solicitor has advised us thst it would be madness.

Of course. He would be liable if he told you it was ok to sign and it went pear-shaped. Also some of these documents might be required for your mortgage. Almost certainly, the 'documentation' that your solicitor is requesting are not documents that are sitting around, but documents that need to be obtained by engaging professionals.

The critical thing is; do the vendors actually want to sell or not? They may feel forced into a sale and now that they have agreed find that being asked to engage surveyors is a step too far. They may also feel that it is you who are the difficult party.

If the issue is planning, you can access the permissions received online and compare them yourself with the house viewing. If something major doesnt fit, then that is a serious problem. However if all seems in order eg no recent extensions etc, then the issue could be either that the vendor is in denial or simply doesnt want to sell and is actively working against you.

Before you call closure on this (which I think you will very likely do), have a sit down with your solicitor and find out exactly what documents he has not produced and what he would have been expected to do to obtain them.

An option might have been to sign the contract, with a clause making it subject to these documents being produced and being acceptable to yourselves.

Quandary

jeamimus wrote: »

Of course. He would be liable if he told you it was ok to sign and it went pear-shaped. Also some of these documents might be required for your mortgage. Almost certainly, the 'documentation' that your solicitor is requesting are not documents that are sitting around, but documents that need to be obtained by engaging professionals.

The critical thing is; do the vendors actually want to sell or not? They may feel forced into a sale and now that they have agreed find that being asked to engage surveyors is a step too far. They may also feel that it is you who are the difficult party.

If the issue is planning, you can access the permissions received online and compare them yourself with the house viewing. If something major doesnt fit, then that is a serious problem. However if all seems in order eg no recent extensions etc, then the issue could be either that the vendor is in denial or simply doesnt want to sell and is actively working against you.

Before you call closure on this (which I think you will very likely do), have a sit down with your solicitor and find out exactly what documents he has not produced and what he would have been expected to do to obtain them.

An option might have been to sign the contract, with a clause making it subject to these documents being produced and being acceptable to yourselves.

Our solicitor is a good friend of mine and he has sat down with us and gone through exactly what docs are missing. He has said our lender will never agree to grant the mortgage without them. He has advised us to pull out before now but my wife was clinging on.

They have 2 more weeks to provide some very standard documentation which we have requested for almost 4 months. If it doesn't arrive we are out. I'm not happy to invest anymore time and money. it would appear the vendor is doing all in his power to scupper the sale.