Sale Agreed - but worrying about delays with the bank. Am I overworrying?

LookingFor

Would appreciate any advice on this.

I went officially sale agreed on a property this week - the offer was accepted last week, booking deposit was paid, and notice of sale was sent this week.

I got mortgage approval in principle and 'house hunter approval' (i.e. the kind they send to the underwriter) close to six months ago.

Once the offer was accepted I got in touch with the bank, but only today did I manage to get through to the person I've been dealing with - she was on leave til now, and others couldn't access her files apparently.

She seemed a bit taken aback by how much had happened since the offer was accepted (i.e. the payment of booking deposit, the arrangement of a structural survey etc). I was calling to ask about moving on to a letter of offer and to ask for a valuation survey to be done ASAP - per my solicitor - but she is saying a letter of offer should come before a valuation survey, and furthermore, there may be a delay to a letter of offer, because she wants to renew my approval because it's coming close to the end of the 6 month approval period.

So I'm scrambling now to get a new salary cert and pay slips to her ASAP, so that we can basically reapply for approval, then apply for 'property specific' approval, and then ultimately, start the process for a 'letter of offer'. She suggested there could be up to 5 working days between each of these stages. And it'll only be at the property specific stage that I'll have a case manager (who will hopefully be easier to get a hold of).

It sounds to me like that could be up to 3 weeks, before I can get a letter of offer to my solicitor. This has me a bit concerned. The notice of sale specifies that contracts need to be signed within 10 days of receipt of contract at the solicitor - in order for that to happen, my solicitor needs the letter of offer and to go over that etc. There is a closing date in November on the notice of sale.

Am I overworrying? Everyone - my solicitor, the agent - is pressing me to ensure a letter of offer is done asap and a valuation survey done asap. How long does it normally take after sale agreed before a buyer's solicitor is in receipt of contract? Do I have very little time to play with? My concern is whether a delay of - say - 2 weeks at the bank will spook the vendor, and that they'll think I'm dilly-dallying.

Any advice would be gratefully received.

BrokenArrows

How close to the end of the approval is it?

LookingFor

BrokenArrows wrote: »

How close to the end of the approval is it?

This is one other thing I've just realised - by her count it was days, but shes counting from the day we did the application together. By the letter of approval that I have there's at least one working week - it says the approval will last 6 months from the date of the letter, which is a week on from the date she referred to. So I will run that by her tomorrow to see if it makes a difference.

(Her concern was that because it was so tight, by the time the 'property specific' process started in a couple of days, the approval would expire and it would be sent back down, delaying things further. And so we might as well start over now rather than waiting for that to happen. But if we actually have over a week of approval time left, I'm wondering now...).

There's one other nuance - the property price (but not the mortgage amount) is slightly different than in the original approval. So maybe they need to re-run the application anyway. But I'd have thought that maybe that could have been done as part of the 'property specific' process, rather than needing a new step one approval.

listermint

Ours took about 8 weeks of back and forth. It depends on many things. There isn't a simple answer to every sale.

LookingFor

listermint wrote: »

Ours took about 8 weeks of back and forth. It depends on many things. There isn't a simple answer to every sale.

Thanks.

I should say - I'm not actually unhappy about the process taking longer or shorter myself.

What I'm worried about is, if there's a delay of a couple of weeks at this stage at the bank, could this knock on and cause the vendor/agent to hesitate and withdraw. That they'll think I'm dilly-dallying if there is that delay.

Everyone I'm speaking too personally is saying it takes a few weeks for contracts to reach a solicitor and it can take months again for contracts to be signed - i.e. don't worry - but I'm having a hard time reconciling that with the blaring urgency of the messaging I'm getting from the agent and the solicitor. People tell me to ignore the 10-day deadline to sign after receipt of contract, that it's all fluff... but it's hard to shake the anxiety that maybe it's not :eek:

lawred2

Don't mind that 10 days nonsense. It's takes multiples of that for everyone who isn't a cash buyer.

tomister

The 10 days turnaround is very unrealistic. It can also take a few weeks for the contracts to be issued to the solicitor. I’m surprised the solicitor is pushing for the other bits to be done when no contracts have landed.

You have your approval currently. Provided there has been no major change to your circumstances in the 6 months the new approvals process shouldn’t take too long and you can explain to the estate agent that you’re near the end of the 6 months so the bank needs new paperwork. It’s standard so it shouldn’t make the vendor nervous

ChewBerecca

Our purchase price was more than the letter of offer price (mortgage value unchanged). Once we had living costs, gift letter from our parents as they were planning on paying solicitor directly but bank needed the money in our accounts, we got the loan pack shortly after.

Our contracts took 5 weeks, no chain sale. Leave on either side but the vendors side took a while to kick into gear despite trying to sell last year.

It would be more uncommon for contracts to be with your solicitor earlier than a few weeks from deposit paid unless the vendor has tried to sell before and has the paperwork ready.