Currently buying/selling a house? How is it going? READ MOD NOTE POST #1

We used them twice and fuond them to be excellent. We pulled out of one purhcase based on their survey.

Anyone have suggestions for surveyor in Drogheda/Louth region? Please send PM

My PPR is for sale. I just found out I need planning permission on double glass doors that I put in instead of a garage door. There is also new decking visible from the front. Does anyone know if I need planning for that too and how long it takes to get such planning and the costs involved? Will this delay the house sale by much?

We ought a house with the same thing. Converted garage and no planning. We could have waited for the vendor to get planning, but we applied for it ourselves after we bought it.

Its very common. It might concern some people but its no big deal. Apply for it yourself anyway. If someone is interested in buying the house solicitors will hammer something out for the unlikely event that either yourself or a buyer dont get planning for it.

In a case i know of there was a large shed in the garden. Another shed was 25sqm so planning was needed for this one. The solicitors arranged for the vendor to remove the roof for the sale to go through. I dont think the roof was ever really removed.

Another question for the kind people of boards!When buying a property do I arrange the valuer myself or is this something the bank organises (but i pay for!)

If its AIB they pick the valuer. You pay valuation fee to them and they appoint valuer who will link in with agent to get it. Very straightforward

hi all we went sale agreed with buyer in March on an apartment my OH inherited. Relatively fast and happy with offer, We are not in chain or anything but got word last week that buyer will pull out really soon if our solicitor doesn’t get contracts over. We have no idea why the delay and have been told twice now that they’re going out in the morning! Have rang called in etc and just promising don’t worry it’s in hand… so so annoyed this may futhrough. Any advice here or is this normal?

Hey folks, I’m in my mid 30’s and started my journey buying a house as a single buyer at the start of 2023. The house I was renting a room in was going to put on the market before the end of 2023. I started saving like hell and watching my spending for 6 months before applying for a mortgage.

Got the AIP in September and started looking. Put bids on 4 different houses over the few months but got outbid on them all. It was quite disheartening and frustrating but kept the chin up. There was very little on the market in my budget and it was constant bidding wars. I needed to re-evaluate what I was willing to compromise on and what was non-negotiable. Eventually I had an offer accepted in April of this year on a lovely second hand house in a nice estate before my rental went up for sale. Was lucky enough to be able to move back in to my parent’s house in the interim.

Delighted to say I collected the keys for my own fantastic house last Thursday :D

It wasn’t an easy process. I had good savings including the deposit and got 4x my salary for my mortgage. But I still needed to bridge the gap so my father very kindly gave me a gift. I know I'm so lucky and privileged to be able to buy my own place and I’m extremely grateful to my dad for helping me, as I know a lot of people don’t have that.

It’s an amazing feeling getting the keys into your hand and knowing that the place is yours and you can do what you want with it. I never thought I’d care so much about paint colours or furniture.

I wish anyone else going through the process the very best of luck. At times it may feel like you’re getting nowhere but keep the head up.

Great to hear - congratulations! My search has been ongoing for many years, will be 40 next year and really could do with my own place now, fingers crossed it will happen for me soon.

We had hassle with solicitors during our purchase process too and know of lots of others who have similar problems. I naively assumed our solicitor was on top of things throughout the process but our experience was that unless you keep on top of them they won't do anything to move things forward. Once I figured that out it was fine but I would not take their word that all is ok, especially if your buyer is threatening to walk. You will need to be firm with them and don't allow yourself to be fobbed off, I let that happen for weeks and weeks (they and their staff seem to be experts at it).

Can anyone give their opinion on the “subject to loan” clause in the contracts?

I am in the process of selling and buying family home. Bit of a chain- FTB-our purchasers-me-vacant home

our buyers have requested the clause be put into the contracts, my solicitor has said it’s standard and recommended by the Law Society, BUT and a big BUT my bank loan offer has the condition of “unconditional and binding contracts be signed by the purchaser”.

as I’m both a seller and a buyer I can see both sides of the coin here.. I don’t want that clause put into my contracts for my sale but obviously would like it put in for my purchase 😂

yes I’m afraid that’s what is going to happen, they will pull out of the sale or we won’t get our mortgage with that clause put in, so we are a screwed either way.

it seems like standard stuff so I’m wondering why do banks insist on unconditional contracts with those moving house 🤔

Thank you, that’s very helpful and appropriate to our situation.

So it’s possible and sounds like there is a way to make it work.

Only thing is we are hoping we aren’t homeless for a week! We have two kids and a dog and no family or friends to move in with !

Just keep going.

That happened to us. We were agreed with the person who owned the house. It wasnt even advertised. Then the house a few doors down went up on myhome for about €50k more than we had agreed to pay. The person called the next day and pulled out. They put it on the market and ended up getting 105k more than we had agreed to pay.

The house we did eventually buy we located without it going on the market again (after falling through a few times because tenants wouldnt move out) and that sale happily went through with no tenants in it.

Small update - vendor lives abroad so the house we are buying is vacant, they’re keen to have quick sale as previous buy fell through after year of sale agreed

We went sale agreed on the house 5 weeks ago, our solicitor received contracts to review lst wk, but now the vendors solicitor is saying deadline to sign is tomorrow !!

no clue where this deadline came from. We, my solicitor and the vendors estate agent are confused and scrambling to find out why there is a deadline.

to only give only one week for pre contract enquiries is unusual. to expect a chain sale to exchange in less than 5 weeks is unheard of surely?.

We have now started to look at other properties in case they pull out. Very slim pickings out there though for our needs.