I’m new to this forum been long time voyeur though, picking up useful bits and pieces here and there.
As i have never bought a property before i am wondering what kind of timelines are involved. What I am really interested in is the time taken to go from being interested in a property, to making a bid, to sale agreed, to sold. I realize the buyer can drive the sale in the early stages but what happens next?
Really what i want to know is the sale agreed to sold.
I ask as there was a house i had my eye on a while back and i’ve been tracking the drop, about 45% at this stage. About 3 months ago it went to sale agreed, and has not changed since. Nada, nothing.
There is really no way to know what the delay may be. Could be any of:
didn’t suit buyer and seller to close early so they mutually agreed a delayed closing
buyer is having difficulty in getting funds
some title/mapping/planning difficulty has arisen
ea was trigger happy in putting up sale agreed
Or in fact many other issues.
You could always phone the ea and ask - it wouldn’t normally be in thier interests to delay getting things tied down.
I wouldn’t read too much into 3 months at Sale Agreed. I bought and sold and both times it took at least that - when buying the seller’s mortgage company claimed to have mislaid the deeds for about 6 weeks… when selling I used a low cost solicitor who was rubbish and slow (a lesson learned - never again). A friend of mine just closed a sale that took 6 months - some messy legal issues I think.
Plus agents rarely update websites once the sale is agreed. Best thing to do is call the EA - if the sale is falling through they will be happy to hear from you.
I sold a house last year, and it took me about a week to choose between the 2 offers on the table. We went from Sale Agreed to Sold in about a month. The offer I accepted was a couple of grand less than the first one. I accepted the lower one as the buyer had loan approval, and he showed my EA a letter from his bank stating that. The other party couldn’t prove an ability to buy. They admitted to my EA that they had not even applied for a mortgage when they made their offer. I went with the slightly lower offer, as I didn’t want to be in limbo land for months while they got their financial ducks in a row. That could be a hold up for a lot of sales.
The eventual buyer was very, very on the ball and very keen. On the day my EA accepted officially accepted his offer, a check arrived by courier for the deposit. I was very on the ball too. Every day, I was on the phone to the solicitor and the EA asking if they had everything they needed, what paperwork was required, who had it, and what were they doing with it, who was sending what form to who, and if the recipient got it ok. I was relentless. I didn’t care if they thought I was being annoying. These people got over 7,000 of my money. I made them earn it. The buyer obviously cracked a mean whip on his end too, and everything was done and dusted a month later.
So my advice to you is…ask lots of questions, diagnose possible causes of trouble and how to fix them before they even happen. If there is a problem or a hiccup, don’t expect to be told about it unless you ask. I guess I was lucky. There were no messy legal issues with the title or deed on my end, or with the buyers finances on his end. I was eager to get the deal done and so was the seller. I had a great EA and solictor. But sometimes you make create your own luck by how you your self handle the situation, and I do think that that played a role too.
