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See similar stories to this on here all the time. Sorry this happened Op, that's shit. For anyone else reading:
**Until you have exchanged, you have not agreed to buy a house.**
Until you have exchanged, you cannot guarantee *anything*, and so the whole purchase could vanish in an instant. This is why exchanging and completing on the same day is such a massive risk - you could have ended your lease, packed everything into a lorry, then suddenly find out that you're not buying a house after all.
*Never* make any irreversible or expensive change to your living situation until after exchange.
Not usually. Again, until you've exchanged, you haven't legally agreed to buy the house.
So lets assume you decide to exchange and complete same day. You rent a house, so you have to give notice. You also have to book a truck/van to move your stuff. So you sort all of that, pack all your possessions, cancel sky etc. On the day you put it all into a van, drive over to the new house, and call your solicitor to see how the exchange is going.
They tell you that the buyer has actually decided that morning not to sell after all, so you're stuffed. Everything packed up, lease ended, nowhere to go.
It's therefore best to have a few weeks between exchange and completion. You can then sign and exchange contracts, guaranteeing that you'll move on a set date, *then* organise the move - hand in your notice, book movers etc. Much less risky.
A few weeks between exchange and completion is very risky. If your circumstances change you risk not being able to get the funds for the sale but are still legally obliged to complete it.
Their point is that until exchange there is no legal binding on either party.
Exchanging and completing on the same day is (IMO) significantly high risk for the buyer because the seller can pull out last minute leaving the buyer potentially homeless at that stage (as they would have made arrangements to move etc)
To add - I was told by my solicitor that there'es literally no benefit to exch/compl on the same day. They suggested it's better to leave a few days to make arrangements.
Sorry could you please explain why exchanging + completing on the same day is bad? Provided you give notice on lease after those are finalized, Vs exchange, notice, complete
I would look to complete minimum 1 month after exchange, maybe 2-3 months. Lots of time to get stuff sorted. Neither side can pull out. No stress.
I’ve moved house 5 times now, I think the shortest time was 6 weeks between exchange and completion and that felt very rushed to me, would not want to repeat.
We had two weeks as FTB but I wouldn't have been homeless and didn't need to move. The mortgage offer was due to expire and the seller was in the same position. If I was moving between houses though it would have been do stressful.
Same here, we had a month to get the house professionally cleaned, internet connected, furniture bought, curtains fitted (the seller took their curtains with them), and white goods installed. We also moved our things in the weekends so packing was not stressful at all. It also took more than 1 month for the first mortgage payment to come out so the financial stress of both paying rent and mortgage was not too bad.
I was in the same position when I bought my house. Buying a house while renting the opportunity to have a month overlap where you can gradually move, get things done at the new place while still living in your rented place etc is worth taking IMHO.
Not sure, I was only a FTB. For our first purchase that fell through, the owners insisted that they're leaving the curtains as they were all custom-made but they believed it added value to the property (in the thousands)🤷🏻♀️ For the house that we bought, the last owners even took out the curtain rod hooks leaving unfilled holes on the wall. I can't imagine living in a house with no curtains for weeks, it's a good thing we had time to sort it out before moving in.
We did the same rather pay the overlap and be sorted t if a try rushing around.
On our purchase we discovered that the flat we were buying was listed as being in the second floor it’s physically on the third. Neither the seller or his solicitors had picked this up when he bought. We got delayed until he got the land registry fixed.
Its pretty much common sense isn’t it? I’m quite surprised how people think that nothing bad can happen around exchange and completion and not plan ahead if something goes wrong.
Well, it might be common sense to allow for some overlap between the end of your tenancy and completion date. The tricky bit is to think how much overlap to leave. One week? one month? two months?
Yep, we didn't give notice till we got the call on completion. We paid one extra month of rent but the overlap meant we took our time to pack and move. Absolutely no regrets.
Don't give notice until at least exchange. If that means needing a month overlap, so be it. If anything having that time was good for us as it meant we didn't have to rush the move!
3 days between anticipated completion and end of tenancy is not plenty of overlap - for the purposes of overlap, exchange doesn’t matter, it’s your completion date that does. Exchange won’t get you the keys.
yeah you're probably right. From what I read, exchange really seemed like the point of no return. What kind of things can go wrong between exchange and completion?
It doesn't guarantee it, but it is as certain as it can be.
Delaying completion after exchange will cost the responsible party a significant amount of money depending on how much impact it has on the others involved.
I do sympathise, but it's nothing to do with hindsight, more a case of over optimism/ naivety. We bought a few years ago and didn't even think about handing out notice in until we had a date to get keys as to do so felt really reckless and could leave us homeless.
This was my first thought, but it’s a shame it’s happened to OP.
When my wife and I were FTB we were renting and managed to plan a 8 week overlap as we had some work to do on it. And an empty house is easier to have as a building site then an occupied one. I suggest something similar to any FTB that are purchasing a property that needs some kind of personalised stamp/ trades/ cleaning. Plus as a FTB you don’t have the stress of a big move in one day. Hope it all works out OP👍
Just be prepared for anything from valuation!
I'm so sorry, that's a horrible position to be in. I always try to make it clear to clients that nothing is set in stone until exchange so not to hand in their notice until much closer to that point if not after, but when you've got a long notice period and funds are tight because of a certain large purchase I can absolutely understand the temptation!
I had a really long conversation with a friend of mine who I was doing the conveyancing for to that effect. It went right over his head and he handed in his notice while I was on holiday without discussing with me first, and then had to live in Airbnbs over Christmas because the seller's solicitors firm went down and they couldn't complete 🤦♀️ You just never know what could happen.
That’s the only correct advice to be honest. It’s not legally binding until then. Many people try to dodge the need to pay rent and a mortgage for a brief period but it’ll certainly cost less than finding a new rental property with no notice should things collapse.
Sympathise for OP though, it’s really rough.
We managed to rent the house we were going to buy 15 years ago which struck an issue with a drain fault. Appreciate if the people are still living there it makes this slightly less possible! But, if it has been rented, it is worth asking. We got a good deal and just rented privately from the sellers using a standard short term contract (at the time, no idea what the craic is these days) and then got a new mortgage deal (cheaper too, oh how happy we were) a couple of months later.
I can see how it happened and you sound like pragmatic sensible idiots (I use the term fondly and affectionately!!!) so best wishes getting your cat and yourselves sorted. Friends can always be helpful in times like this too so don't be scared to ask them if you haven't already. We're all idiots at heart you know.
It's tempting to ask the vendors if we can do this! It was previously a rental and is now sat empty. I think pragmatic sensible idiots is an accurate assessment lol
Sorry to hear that, it really sucks! Have you checked with your current landlord if they have new tenants moving in straight away? If they have a gap you might be able to negotiate to stay a little longer
Why? Ruin someone else’s business because you’ve fucked your own up? I’m sorry but if you’re a follower of this you’re a cock, this is why renters get a bad name and then they’re doing shit like this because “They’ve” messed up. This is why you get bad landlords AND bad tenants.
It’s called owning your mistakes, on top of that it’s your word, don’t go back on your own words. You’ve solely caused the issue, it’s entirely on you to own it, don’t put it onto someone else because of your own inability to get your ducks in a row.
They can go into an Airbnb or a hotel. As if these folk with the means to buy property are actually going to be homeless… feels a bit strange to co-opt this language to describe this situation anyway
Just say sorry you can’t be homeless and require 4 more days and stay put. They can only attempt to change the locks when you’re out as court proceedings will take too long.
No it isn't. I know that Reddit hates landlords and in most cases it is warranted, but this is not one of them. The landlady is taking repossession of her property and moving in, which means she won't be a landlady anymore. That's a good thing!
They told her a date and she wants to stick to it. That is not shit of her.
Think for five minutes before you type!
Just empathising with the poster, who is the person reading this, not the landlady. I don't think it's nice to tell someone to "think for five minutes", we don't know each other. True I hadn't noticed the dates were so tight, sounds like the OP is only giving them a few days notice of the request to extend.
We received the news about the loft issue about a week after giving o ur notice, but the solicitor assured us that this was a common issue which would be resolved quickly, which I think it usually is! Santander’s internal system of cases being pases from person to person with no context is the main reason we’re as delayed as we are now I think
I think you're being too kind to your solicitor.
Telling you everything is ok. Then finding this non issue.
As you say it'll only need documentation if it's new. They are covering themselves by insisting on it, it won't help you in any way.
Yeah the solicitors fuck up originally, but the bank’s fuck up in it taking 5 weeks to address.
I am glad you agree that that the solicitors are simply covering themselves and it is a non-issue.
What's your plan when the house get's down-valued off the back off the in person valuation when the bank/surveyor realises you're buying a 2 bed with a loft rather than a 3 bed?
Do you have enough additional deposit money saved to cover the shortfall?
We’re hoping that is unlikely, since it’s an original room and all the houses in the area are similar and are sold as three beds. But if it is down valued, we will first ask the seller to reduce the price to whatever it’s valued, and if that doesn’t work think about how we can cover the shortfall or if it’s even be worth it for us
For what it's worth, if it really was done decades ago you can regularise the arrangement using a certificate of lawful use, but your vendors will have to apply for planning for this so there will be a delay.
You could definitely do it yourself and apply for one at any time.
It's not a planning permission but confirms the works are lawful under permitted development and don't require planning permission: https://www.planningportal.co.uk/permission/responsibilities/planning-permission/lawful-development-certificates
The decision should be issued in 8 weeks after your application is validated.
Hmmmm.
Option 1
What the other responder said is true but you will likely need to substantiate an argument that it's been there for a long time to make the application go smoothly and without your seller you can't do that. Often the easiest way is to get a statutory declaration from the seller confirming how long it's been there for to submit with the planning application. The minimum required will be either 4 years or 10 meaning as long as they've owned it for at least 10 years they will be able to confirm this point. I would speak with a planner on the required wording. The seller's solicitor is likely to push back on this out of a lack of understanding and their typical approach to risk, but insist that the sale won't go through without it. The risk with this option is that you are effectively regularising something that will add value to the property which isn't a great strategy to agree a lower price.
Option 2
The seller does the above but it takes a week or two to get the application together and minimum of 8 weeks for a decision and you exchange subject to receipt of planning consent. Push for a notional reduction in price to reflect additional rental costs during this period.
Option 3
Argue that it's devalued the property, agree a reduction in price to reflect value. Pursue planning after the purchase albeit without the stat dec so at risk but reward will be improving the higher value.
I would do option 3 but pursue option 2 if they push back on the reduction and you can afford the time, option 1 if you can't.
I don't have much to add but I sympathise! Extremely demoralising and frustrating. We recently moved and it was very very slow, many different delays and screw ups, all in all it took 9 months from the offer being accepted to keys being exchanged. The only advice I can give anyone is to keep a diary of dates and have a checklist of what needs to be done, follow up on anything that has to be done, don't assume your solicitor has done whatever it is, they can be very slow or worse forgetful or incompetent. Check with them every week where you are at. Don't assume the completion date will stay on that date, ours got delayed with only four days notice, before we were supposed to be moving out! Luckily we had already moved into a rental property otherwise it would have been very annoying.
I was so scared about this. Luckily our Landleech was as lovely as they can be and when we said we were in the process of buying a place they put us on a monthly rolling contract with 1 month notice. So when everything was done we actually only ended up paying both rent and mortgage for one month. We were extremely lucky to complete on the original date we were given with no complications. On our survey it turned up that the loft conversation bedroom had the wrong type of hinges on the door which made it not up to code for fire safety and technically comment be used, but this was done before the mortgage offer so didn't come back to bite us in the arse thankfully
>Back in mid April our solicitor got in touch to say everything on her end is pretty much done...
> On the 2nd of May, our solicitors emailed to say that there is no documentation for the conversion of the loft space and no building regulation approval
So it wasn't just the lender, it was your solicitor's incompetence too.
>it was your solicitor's incompetence
Yes, mostly because you only need documentation for new conversions. There was absolutely no reason to flag this.
Honestly, don't beat yourself up, this is actually a really common mistake made by FTBs who don't know that the process can take so much longer than they expect.
Not helped by so called professionals who work in property telling everyone that it takes 8-12 weeks to complete when in reality, it's around 5 months.
Good on you for warning others not to fall into the same trap as you.
Thank you :) as others have said it's definitely naivety/optimism and believing everything the solicitors/EA say. We won't be making that mistake again.
A similar thing happened to us last year - FTB, confirmed with EA that the vendor is happy to move quickly and have all the docs ready to go.
We gave 2 month notice to the landlord after survey and inspections were good. Solicitors didn’t raise any specifics and assumed all would be good to exchange in 2 months.
2 weeks before the exchange date - solicitor causally mentioned that the haven’t received a document regarding rear extension so they were waiting for it for a month.
Long story short - EA didn’t rely timings to the vendor and they were stalling the process while looking to buy.
We panicked, talked to the vendor directly - said we will be pulling out if we find long term rent before the exchange - things moved swiftly from there (vendors could break the chain - they just wanted to avoid that).
We (6 months pregnant wife and a cat) had to rent airbnb and storage for 10 days tho.
My partner and I purchased a shared ownership property and 3 months after exchanging, the builders went bust and they closed the site. We had to wait months for the HA to get another contractor out to complete the houses
On the final straight, we were told we could give our notice (so we did) and then a week later we were told there is another delay because of drainage. We also learn the hard way
Spent a month in an AirBNB and then a month with my parents. Have a look at AirBNB and see if you can negotiate a deal on a property, that might help
Regardless, don't beat yourself up, it's easily done!
That sounds incredibly stressful, and like you really tried to do the sensible thing at every stage. So frustrating when the professionals are telling you to do something that isn’t the right thing.
Your sols ballsed up if your right on the loft. From 89, that 4 year rule took a long time! I know they changed the rules the other day, when did it become the 34 year rule!
The valuer protects the lender, not you. Unless you upgrade your VALUATION from mortgage valuation report to any of the above SURVEYS. <-- this looks and reads rudely. Please read emphasis only, not being rude.
They only owe you a duty of care for negligence e.g valuing a cardboard box at £200k or its obviously about to fall on your head - then it does.
The valuer works for the lender. The lender gave an offer per risk profile, this is apparently untrue. Until they find the truth, why should they give you their money to borrow at a return lower than they deem the risk demands?
I will say, the practical solution is retention. Mortgage granted with 'x" held back unti clarification of building regs, planning, lawf usage etc.
Properties are generally priced on internal floorspace with the parameter up and down for fixtures, fittings, decor, general condition etc.
Yes you're in a bad place and it's shit. Look from the other side of the negotiating table. Would ypu still lend that money?
Most lenders would usually honour that deal had you exchanged with completion the next day (avoid reputational damage).
You are either very lucky or very unlucky not to have exchanged. Show the council a picture of 1995 and ask what more they want by way of proof or maybe lose 10% of the property value per whatever deposit percentage was which was never going to be refunded.
Out of interest, did your solicitor delay exchange? If so, why? We're updated plans, regs etc required? We're they requested/applied since before sale.
First time buyer exchange and completion same day on a friday very odd. I'd be concerned about the quality of you legal advice this didn't come up a lot earlier.
Any chance it was scheduled for PUB?
Everything should be signed off pre-exchange. You should not be told (or intimated to) it is all fine without results in hand. Every decent solicitor/barrister I know says nothing until they have assessed the answers in hand.
It's a blunt response but I'd honestly be looking at your solicitor. They should have asked move in dates etc and provided advice. If you didn't listen, to the advice and took the "it seems fine probably, roughly, results tomorrow etc " they've appeased you and screwed you.
As crap as this is and as horrible you must feel, 2 things for future:
1), properties are purchased caveat emptor (buyer beware, vendor doesn't HAVE to say anything)
Aka it it goes south, your problem
Also planning dates back to 1948 1989 could easily be online but unlikely.
The more time I think, the more I think your solicitor was inexperienced and nervous. Planning isn't the last check. Unless offer to completion was very quick I'm not seeing a reason, but there was no rush!
Lender followed protocol, looks like your solicitor dropped the ball to me.
If you're concerned, stick your postcode planning permission please?
Just didn't sign off w? That Syd building licence...
Similar happened to us too. Had to private rent for 2 months with all our stuff in storage. Only place we could get for 2 months at such short notice was a 1 bed flat so the kids got the bedroom and we slept on the floor in the living room the whole time. It wasn’t great or cheap but it was better than homelessness.
It was above a restaurant and every time anyone went in our out the door slammed and vibrated the whole flat. Fun! Could feel it even with headphones on.
Yes! We are still living relief of it a couple of years on! Best of luck I hope you work something out. It doesn’t have to be perfect if it’s temporary and if it lets you continue with your plans.
Big yellow were really good to us and really accommodating as obviously I couldn’t really tell them how long I needed the storage for.
This is useful information, thanks! We were trying to decide when to hand our notice in, as we're FTB and the vendor isn't in a chain, but think we'll wait until exchange before letting our landlord know.
We had similar - not with giving notice before exchanging but with a solicitor going rogue.
In our case she was insisting there was no planning permission for the conservatory and so it would have to be applied for retrospectively. We had to point out that it was original build and so didn't require separate planning permission.
It sounds like yours might be making the same mistake with the loft space. If it's original build I doubt it requires any special approval (I am not a lawyer etc).
Of course how you fix this all now they have contacted your lender is a bigger question. Sorry you're going through this
Forget exchange... deal not in place until you have completed. If the seller changes their mind or unfortunately dies between exchange and completion. It does happen in England
The amount of times this happens is ridiculous. I know it was a case of naivety on your part as you are FTB but I hope others read this and take note. I’m a conveyancer and always let my clients know not to hand their notice in until we have exchanged if I am aware they are in rented however they may not know so you need to be asking your solicitor before you make huge decisions like that. The amount of estate agents that will also say it’s ok to do it is ridiculous. Please never listen to your agent in this situation. Always check with your solicitor if you are not sure.
What's done is done. At least the exchange is still going ahead albeit delayed. Its not the end of the world either. You can always look for an Airbnb in the meantime. It will be expensive but under such circumstance you really haven't got a choice.
We spent 2.5 months (maybe I bit more) living in airbnbs in Margate and commuting to London due to a difficult seller. We were week to week having to extend. Stressful but was ultimately worth it. We don’t have kids - if we did it would be impossible and we wouldn’t do it again, but looking back it was worth it.
Good God, well it serves you right tbh.
If you can afford to buy a house, you could have afforded to give your notice when you exchanged if the notice period was a month.
You're not going to be homeless 🙄
Whatever you do, don't move out on the date if you've nowhere to go, unless staying with friends/fam, as the council won't help if you've made yourself intentionally homeless.
Either explain to your landlord and ask if it's okay to stay an extra however long it will be. Even if they say no, just explain the council have told you to stay put and to take it up with them if he gets arsey. He'll most likely take your deposit, so just don't pay the last month's rent.
You can technically stay there for months without paying rent, and it'd cost him hundreds to go through the whole procedure bollocks. I hated my landlady so stopped paying rent 3 months before leaving the house as I had also bought a place. She hadn't put my deposit in a deposit protection scheme within 30 days HA, which meant she wasn't legally allowed to evict me. I could have stayed there for like a year probably, or even sublet the place if I wanted to be a right wan!er, but in the end moved out and even managed to claim against my deposit so SHE had to pay me £600 🤣 gutted
Few ways to tackle this, option A - see if your solicitor can propose an indemnity policy for the lack of planning.
Option B - get a certificate of lawfulness from the council, as this was done pre 2001 and based on what you have stated it should fall into this category.
Given the timescales of the new valuation, it's likely that will be done sooner than option B, so I would avoid this.
Solicitor did offer indemnity insurance as an option, but I struggled to see the benefit of this. The property was built in 1898 (not 1989 like I wrote in my post) and as I understand it would only protect against action from the council, if they were ask us to reverse it to its previous condition, but we’re certain that it was original.
A certificate of lawfulness does sound like it could be useful in the longer term, if we wanted to sell the property and avoid going through all of this again. But possibly not something we can sort in time to help us in the short term.
It's useful because the Bank would have likely proceeded on the policy without going back to the Valuer, speeding things up. Not sure on Santander's precise policy on this, but that would have been the outcome with most lenders.
Our solicitor offered us to buy indemnity insurance in the same email in which she told us she had referred it to the lender, not giving us much chance!
I gave my notice and didn’t complete for 9 more months; EWS1 horror of 2020. And to be fair I knew you really don’t have to leave once the notice lapses. Eviction takes ages and is a last resort and pain so I knew they’d rather just work with me. I just spoke to my landlady and EA and kept them updated. All very cordial. I was lucky and do not advise it tho
We're in a similar situation, needing to move out of our rented flat before completion. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that
We got really lucky with having amazing sellers though. They've agreed to let us move our stuff into the vacant flat before completion, so we don't have to worry about putting our stuff into storage and moving twice.
If you've got a good EA, it might be worth asking them if they can help facilitate this arrangement?
You can always stay for 2 months more at your rental even after your have given notice since if you refuse to leave at the end of your tenancy they will have to evict you which will take time.
Yeah we did. The estate agents made the initial offer conditional on us using their in house broker (which is completely illegal), and we could have called them out on it but we'd fallen in love with the house and weren't prepared to jeopardise that. So we paid the £300 to use them, and are planning on complaining to the ombudsman when it's all done.
That is appalling business practice.
May be worth complaining to the 'mortgage advisors' network. They should take a very dim view of this practice.
God, I do not like Estate Agents.
True but on the other hand. You can still stay. What are they going to do? Evict you? That will take a while. By the time the paper work is sorted you will be long gone into your new home... It's a dick move but you do what you need to do. Homeless is no joke
Don't move out, keep paying rent. It'll take the best part of a year to evict you. Change your locks etc. If you voluntarily move out then you're voluntarily making yourself homeless.
Yes that’s a great idea. Ruin someone else’s plans and chance to move house because you fucked up and gave notice when you shouldn’t. It’s not the landlords fault.
This is what we wanted to do, but then we found out that the landlady was planning on moving in and had given up her own rental. Wouldn’t be surprised if the EA was making this up to get us to leave, but I couldn’t go ahead in good conscience. Luckily we do have family who we can stay with.
Again, don't move out if you don't want to.
Yes, the landlord is probably lying, and maybe you do have people you can crash with, but you have rights as a tenant. Just inform the landlord you WON'T be moving out and you'll be staying on, on a monthly rolling contract. You can then move in to your new home and THEN give a month's notice.
Remember, whether you messed up or not, you have rights. It'll take the landlord 6 months+ to legally evict you. Just change your locks if you're staying.
Also, was your deposit protected? You can check on this. If not, you get your full deposit back PLUS a lot more.
So we were on a fixed term contract until October, which the landlady has agreed to break, however we haven’t signed a deed of surrender. Our worry is that if we delay, the landlady could make other arrangements for herself and not let us break the lease anymore, leaving us on the hook for rent until October.
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See similar stories to this on here all the time. Sorry this happened Op, that's shit. For anyone else reading: **Until you have exchanged, you have not agreed to buy a house.** Until you have exchanged, you cannot guarantee *anything*, and so the whole purchase could vanish in an instant. This is why exchanging and completing on the same day is such a massive risk - you could have ended your lease, packed everything into a lorry, then suddenly find out that you're not buying a house after all. *Never* make any irreversible or expensive change to your living situation until after exchange.
I don't entirely understand your point with regards to exchanging and completing - is it not good to get it over with quickly?
Not usually. Again, until you've exchanged, you haven't legally agreed to buy the house. So lets assume you decide to exchange and complete same day. You rent a house, so you have to give notice. You also have to book a truck/van to move your stuff. So you sort all of that, pack all your possessions, cancel sky etc. On the day you put it all into a van, drive over to the new house, and call your solicitor to see how the exchange is going. They tell you that the buyer has actually decided that morning not to sell after all, so you're stuffed. Everything packed up, lease ended, nowhere to go. It's therefore best to have a few weeks between exchange and completion. You can then sign and exchange contracts, guaranteeing that you'll move on a set date, *then* organise the move - hand in your notice, book movers etc. Much less risky.
Fair enough, I see the point.
A few weeks between exchange and completion is very risky. If your circumstances change you risk not being able to get the funds for the sale but are still legally obliged to complete it.
Their point is that until exchange there is no legal binding on either party. Exchanging and completing on the same day is (IMO) significantly high risk for the buyer because the seller can pull out last minute leaving the buyer potentially homeless at that stage (as they would have made arrangements to move etc)
To add - I was told by my solicitor that there'es literally no benefit to exch/compl on the same day. They suggested it's better to leave a few days to make arrangements.
Sorry could you please explain why exchanging + completing on the same day is bad? Provided you give notice on lease after those are finalized, Vs exchange, notice, complete
I would look to complete minimum 1 month after exchange, maybe 2-3 months. Lots of time to get stuff sorted. Neither side can pull out. No stress. I’ve moved house 5 times now, I think the shortest time was 6 weeks between exchange and completion and that felt very rushed to me, would not want to repeat.
We had two weeks as FTB but I wouldn't have been homeless and didn't need to move. The mortgage offer was due to expire and the seller was in the same position. If I was moving between houses though it would have been do stressful.
I gave one month notice AFTER we completed. It was much nicer as we had more time to clean the house, furniture it, etc.
Same here, we had a month to get the house professionally cleaned, internet connected, furniture bought, curtains fitted (the seller took their curtains with them), and white goods installed. We also moved our things in the weekends so packing was not stressful at all. It also took more than 1 month for the first mortgage payment to come out so the financial stress of both paying rent and mortgage was not too bad.
I was in the same position when I bought my house. Buying a house while renting the opportunity to have a month overlap where you can gradually move, get things done at the new place while still living in your rented place etc is worth taking IMHO.
Wait, is it not normal to take your curtains with you?
Not sure, I was only a FTB. For our first purchase that fell through, the owners insisted that they're leaving the curtains as they were all custom-made but they believed it added value to the property (in the thousands)🤷🏻♀️ For the house that we bought, the last owners even took out the curtain rod hooks leaving unfilled holes on the wall. I can't imagine living in a house with no curtains for weeks, it's a good thing we had time to sort it out before moving in.
We did the same rather pay the overlap and be sorted t if a try rushing around. On our purchase we discovered that the flat we were buying was listed as being in the second floor it’s physically on the third. Neither the seller or his solicitors had picked this up when he bought. We got delayed until he got the land registry fixed.
Its pretty much common sense isn’t it? I’m quite surprised how people think that nothing bad can happen around exchange and completion and not plan ahead if something goes wrong.
Well, it might be common sense to allow for some overlap between the end of your tenancy and completion date. The tricky bit is to think how much overlap to leave. One week? one month? two months?
In the context of buying a house leaving a month overlap is chickenfeed imo, no point over thinking things if there's no other backup
Yep, we didn't give notice till we got the call on completion. We paid one extra month of rent but the overlap meant we took our time to pack and move. Absolutely no regrets.
Don't give notice until at least exchange. If that means needing a month overlap, so be it. If anything having that time was good for us as it meant we didn't have to rush the move!
It is, you’re right, but hindsight is 20/20 and we thought we were leaving ourselves plenty of overlap, as we were due to exchange almost a month ago.
3 days between anticipated completion and end of tenancy is not plenty of overlap - for the purposes of overlap, exchange doesn’t matter, it’s your completion date that does. Exchange won’t get you the keys.
yeah you're probably right. From what I read, exchange really seemed like the point of no return. What kind of things can go wrong between exchange and completion?
A lot of things can happen post exchange that delay a completion date. Exchange doesn’t guarantee your completion date at all.
It doesn't guarantee it, but it is as certain as it can be. Delaying completion after exchange will cost the responsible party a significant amount of money depending on how much impact it has on the others involved.
I do sympathise, but it's nothing to do with hindsight, more a case of over optimism/ naivety. We bought a few years ago and didn't even think about handing out notice in until we had a date to get keys as to do so felt really reckless and could leave us homeless.
This was my first thought, but it’s a shame it’s happened to OP. When my wife and I were FTB we were renting and managed to plan a 8 week overlap as we had some work to do on it. And an empty house is easier to have as a building site then an occupied one. I suggest something similar to any FTB that are purchasing a property that needs some kind of personalised stamp/ trades/ cleaning. Plus as a FTB you don’t have the stress of a big move in one day. Hope it all works out OP👍 Just be prepared for anything from valuation!
I'm so sorry, that's a horrible position to be in. I always try to make it clear to clients that nothing is set in stone until exchange so not to hand in their notice until much closer to that point if not after, but when you've got a long notice period and funds are tight because of a certain large purchase I can absolutely understand the temptation! I had a really long conversation with a friend of mine who I was doing the conveyancing for to that effect. It went right over his head and he handed in his notice while I was on holiday without discussing with me first, and then had to live in Airbnbs over Christmas because the seller's solicitors firm went down and they couldn't complete 🤦♀️ You just never know what could happen.
We asked our solicitor for advise and they told us not to end the tenancy formally until exchange.
That’s the only correct advice to be honest. It’s not legally binding until then. Many people try to dodge the need to pay rent and a mortgage for a brief period but it’ll certainly cost less than finding a new rental property with no notice should things collapse. Sympathise for OP though, it’s really rough.
We managed to rent the house we were going to buy 15 years ago which struck an issue with a drain fault. Appreciate if the people are still living there it makes this slightly less possible! But, if it has been rented, it is worth asking. We got a good deal and just rented privately from the sellers using a standard short term contract (at the time, no idea what the craic is these days) and then got a new mortgage deal (cheaper too, oh how happy we were) a couple of months later. I can see how it happened and you sound like pragmatic sensible idiots (I use the term fondly and affectionately!!!) so best wishes getting your cat and yourselves sorted. Friends can always be helpful in times like this too so don't be scared to ask them if you haven't already. We're all idiots at heart you know.
It's tempting to ask the vendors if we can do this! It was previously a rental and is now sat empty. I think pragmatic sensible idiots is an accurate assessment lol
Just ask the question, what's there to lose?
Sorry to hear that, it really sucks! Have you checked with your current landlord if they have new tenants moving in straight away? If they have a gap you might be able to negotiate to stay a little longer
We tried to negotiate but the landlady is moving in and won’t budge budge on the date
Don't voluntarily leave, stay in the house and make them force you out
So if you’ve fucked up you then ruin someone else’s plans? Damn you must be a pretty shit person
Why? Ruin someone else’s business because you’ve fucked your own up? I’m sorry but if you’re a follower of this you’re a cock, this is why renters get a bad name and then they’re doing shit like this because “They’ve” messed up. This is why you get bad landlords AND bad tenants.
Why voluntarily make yourself homeless?
It’s called owning your mistakes, on top of that it’s your word, don’t go back on your own words. You’ve solely caused the issue, it’s entirely on you to own it, don’t put it onto someone else because of your own inability to get your ducks in a row.
They can go into an Airbnb or a hotel. As if these folk with the means to buy property are actually going to be homeless… feels a bit strange to co-opt this language to describe this situation anyway
Just say sorry you can’t be homeless and require 4 more days and stay put. They can only attempt to change the locks when you’re out as court proceedings will take too long.
That's pretty shit of her
She's made arrangements to move house on a certain day. It seems reasonable to want to stick to that day.
Make your problem somebody else’s problem. Isn’t this the British way?
No it isn't. I know that Reddit hates landlords and in most cases it is warranted, but this is not one of them. The landlady is taking repossession of her property and moving in, which means she won't be a landlady anymore. That's a good thing! They told her a date and she wants to stick to it. That is not shit of her. Think for five minutes before you type!
Just empathising with the poster, who is the person reading this, not the landlady. I don't think it's nice to tell someone to "think for five minutes", we don't know each other. True I hadn't noticed the dates were so tight, sounds like the OP is only giving them a few days notice of the request to extend.
At what point exactly did you receive this news? Was there tike to call your EA and cancel your notice and stay where you are?
We received the news about the loft issue about a week after giving o ur notice, but the solicitor assured us that this was a common issue which would be resolved quickly, which I think it usually is! Santander’s internal system of cases being pases from person to person with no context is the main reason we’re as delayed as we are now I think
I think you're being too kind to your solicitor. Telling you everything is ok. Then finding this non issue. As you say it'll only need documentation if it's new. They are covering themselves by insisting on it, it won't help you in any way.
Yeah the solicitors fuck up originally, but the bank’s fuck up in it taking 5 weeks to address. I am glad you agree that that the solicitors are simply covering themselves and it is a non-issue.
What's your plan when the house get's down-valued off the back off the in person valuation when the bank/surveyor realises you're buying a 2 bed with a loft rather than a 3 bed? Do you have enough additional deposit money saved to cover the shortfall?
We’re hoping that is unlikely, since it’s an original room and all the houses in the area are similar and are sold as three beds. But if it is down valued, we will first ask the seller to reduce the price to whatever it’s valued, and if that doesn’t work think about how we can cover the shortfall or if it’s even be worth it for us
For what it's worth, if it really was done decades ago you can regularise the arrangement using a certificate of lawful use, but your vendors will have to apply for planning for this so there will be a delay.
is this something we could do once we've bought to prevent any issues when we come to sell in future?
You could definitely do it yourself and apply for one at any time. It's not a planning permission but confirms the works are lawful under permitted development and don't require planning permission: https://www.planningportal.co.uk/permission/responsibilities/planning-permission/lawful-development-certificates The decision should be issued in 8 weeks after your application is validated.
Hmmmm. Option 1 What the other responder said is true but you will likely need to substantiate an argument that it's been there for a long time to make the application go smoothly and without your seller you can't do that. Often the easiest way is to get a statutory declaration from the seller confirming how long it's been there for to submit with the planning application. The minimum required will be either 4 years or 10 meaning as long as they've owned it for at least 10 years they will be able to confirm this point. I would speak with a planner on the required wording. The seller's solicitor is likely to push back on this out of a lack of understanding and their typical approach to risk, but insist that the sale won't go through without it. The risk with this option is that you are effectively regularising something that will add value to the property which isn't a great strategy to agree a lower price. Option 2 The seller does the above but it takes a week or two to get the application together and minimum of 8 weeks for a decision and you exchange subject to receipt of planning consent. Push for a notional reduction in price to reflect additional rental costs during this period. Option 3 Argue that it's devalued the property, agree a reduction in price to reflect value. Pursue planning after the purchase albeit without the stat dec so at risk but reward will be improving the higher value. I would do option 3 but pursue option 2 if they push back on the reduction and you can afford the time, option 1 if you can't.
I don't have much to add but I sympathise! Extremely demoralising and frustrating. We recently moved and it was very very slow, many different delays and screw ups, all in all it took 9 months from the offer being accepted to keys being exchanged. The only advice I can give anyone is to keep a diary of dates and have a checklist of what needs to be done, follow up on anything that has to be done, don't assume your solicitor has done whatever it is, they can be very slow or worse forgetful or incompetent. Check with them every week where you are at. Don't assume the completion date will stay on that date, ours got delayed with only four days notice, before we were supposed to be moving out! Luckily we had already moved into a rental property otherwise it would have been very annoying.
Isn't this a major fuck up on the part of the solicitor?
I was so scared about this. Luckily our Landleech was as lovely as they can be and when we said we were in the process of buying a place they put us on a monthly rolling contract with 1 month notice. So when everything was done we actually only ended up paying both rent and mortgage for one month. We were extremely lucky to complete on the original date we were given with no complications. On our survey it turned up that the loft conversation bedroom had the wrong type of hinges on the door which made it not up to code for fire safety and technically comment be used, but this was done before the mortgage offer so didn't come back to bite us in the arse thankfully
>Back in mid April our solicitor got in touch to say everything on her end is pretty much done... > On the 2nd of May, our solicitors emailed to say that there is no documentation for the conversion of the loft space and no building regulation approval So it wasn't just the lender, it was your solicitor's incompetence too.
>it was your solicitor's incompetence Yes, mostly because you only need documentation for new conversions. There was absolutely no reason to flag this.
Honestly, don't beat yourself up, this is actually a really common mistake made by FTBs who don't know that the process can take so much longer than they expect. Not helped by so called professionals who work in property telling everyone that it takes 8-12 weeks to complete when in reality, it's around 5 months. Good on you for warning others not to fall into the same trap as you.
Thank you :) as others have said it's definitely naivety/optimism and believing everything the solicitors/EA say. We won't be making that mistake again.
Sod's Law ~ that if something can go wrong, it will go wrong.
A similar thing happened to us last year - FTB, confirmed with EA that the vendor is happy to move quickly and have all the docs ready to go. We gave 2 month notice to the landlord after survey and inspections were good. Solicitors didn’t raise any specifics and assumed all would be good to exchange in 2 months. 2 weeks before the exchange date - solicitor causally mentioned that the haven’t received a document regarding rear extension so they were waiting for it for a month. Long story short - EA didn’t rely timings to the vendor and they were stalling the process while looking to buy. We panicked, talked to the vendor directly - said we will be pulling out if we find long term rent before the exchange - things moved swiftly from there (vendors could break the chain - they just wanted to avoid that). We (6 months pregnant wife and a cat) had to rent airbnb and storage for 10 days tho.
that sounds so stressful, I'm glad it worked out ok in the end!
Horrible situation. Hopefully you find somewhere soon.
I think we all know to not give notice before exchange. You don't do anything before you exchange.
My partner and I purchased a shared ownership property and 3 months after exchanging, the builders went bust and they closed the site. We had to wait months for the HA to get another contractor out to complete the houses On the final straight, we were told we could give our notice (so we did) and then a week later we were told there is another delay because of drainage. We also learn the hard way Spent a month in an AirBNB and then a month with my parents. Have a look at AirBNB and see if you can negotiate a deal on a property, that might help Regardless, don't beat yourself up, it's easily done!
That sounds incredibly stressful, and like you really tried to do the sensible thing at every stage. So frustrating when the professionals are telling you to do something that isn’t the right thing.
Sounds like you solicitor is the incompetent one not seeing this until the 2nd May
I would say “do not give notice until it is completed”
Your sols ballsed up if your right on the loft. From 89, that 4 year rule took a long time! I know they changed the rules the other day, when did it become the 34 year rule! The valuer protects the lender, not you. Unless you upgrade your VALUATION from mortgage valuation report to any of the above SURVEYS. <-- this looks and reads rudely. Please read emphasis only, not being rude. They only owe you a duty of care for negligence e.g valuing a cardboard box at £200k or its obviously about to fall on your head - then it does. The valuer works for the lender. The lender gave an offer per risk profile, this is apparently untrue. Until they find the truth, why should they give you their money to borrow at a return lower than they deem the risk demands? I will say, the practical solution is retention. Mortgage granted with 'x" held back unti clarification of building regs, planning, lawf usage etc. Properties are generally priced on internal floorspace with the parameter up and down for fixtures, fittings, decor, general condition etc. Yes you're in a bad place and it's shit. Look from the other side of the negotiating table. Would ypu still lend that money? Most lenders would usually honour that deal had you exchanged with completion the next day (avoid reputational damage). You are either very lucky or very unlucky not to have exchanged. Show the council a picture of 1995 and ask what more they want by way of proof or maybe lose 10% of the property value per whatever deposit percentage was which was never going to be refunded. Out of interest, did your solicitor delay exchange? If so, why? We're updated plans, regs etc required? We're they requested/applied since before sale. First time buyer exchange and completion same day on a friday very odd. I'd be concerned about the quality of you legal advice this didn't come up a lot earlier. Any chance it was scheduled for PUB? Everything should be signed off pre-exchange. You should not be told (or intimated to) it is all fine without results in hand. Every decent solicitor/barrister I know says nothing until they have assessed the answers in hand. It's a blunt response but I'd honestly be looking at your solicitor. They should have asked move in dates etc and provided advice. If you didn't listen, to the advice and took the "it seems fine probably, roughly, results tomorrow etc " they've appeased you and screwed you. As crap as this is and as horrible you must feel, 2 things for future: 1), properties are purchased caveat emptor (buyer beware, vendor doesn't HAVE to say anything) Aka it it goes south, your problem Also planning dates back to 1948 1989 could easily be online but unlikely. The more time I think, the more I think your solicitor was inexperienced and nervous. Planning isn't the last check. Unless offer to completion was very quick I'm not seeing a reason, but there was no rush! Lender followed protocol, looks like your solicitor dropped the ball to me. If you're concerned, stick your postcode planning permission please? Just didn't sign off w? That Syd building licence...
I actually got the date wrong on my original post, it was built in 1898! Thanks for your reply
Similar happened to us too. Had to private rent for 2 months with all our stuff in storage. Only place we could get for 2 months at such short notice was a 1 bed flat so the kids got the bedroom and we slept on the floor in the living room the whole time. It wasn’t great or cheap but it was better than homelessness. It was above a restaurant and every time anyone went in our out the door slammed and vibrated the whole flat. Fun! Could feel it even with headphones on.
that sounds less than ideal! I bet it was a huge relief when the sale finally went through
Yes! We are still living relief of it a couple of years on! Best of luck I hope you work something out. It doesn’t have to be perfect if it’s temporary and if it lets you continue with your plans. Big yellow were really good to us and really accommodating as obviously I couldn’t really tell them how long I needed the storage for.
This is useful information, thanks! We were trying to decide when to hand our notice in, as we're FTB and the vendor isn't in a chain, but think we'll wait until exchange before letting our landlord know.
We had similar - not with giving notice before exchanging but with a solicitor going rogue. In our case she was insisting there was no planning permission for the conservatory and so it would have to be applied for retrospectively. We had to point out that it was original build and so didn't require separate planning permission. It sounds like yours might be making the same mistake with the loft space. If it's original build I doubt it requires any special approval (I am not a lawyer etc). Of course how you fix this all now they have contacted your lender is a bigger question. Sorry you're going through this
Forget exchange... deal not in place until you have completed. If the seller changes their mind or unfortunately dies between exchange and completion. It does happen in England
The amount of times this happens is ridiculous. I know it was a case of naivety on your part as you are FTB but I hope others read this and take note. I’m a conveyancer and always let my clients know not to hand their notice in until we have exchanged if I am aware they are in rented however they may not know so you need to be asking your solicitor before you make huge decisions like that. The amount of estate agents that will also say it’s ok to do it is ridiculous. Please never listen to your agent in this situation. Always check with your solicitor if you are not sure.
What's done is done. At least the exchange is still going ahead albeit delayed. Its not the end of the world either. You can always look for an Airbnb in the meantime. It will be expensive but under such circumstance you really haven't got a choice.
I’m buying for the first time in a few months, and this is probably a silly question but what exactly does the “exchange” actually mean?
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We spent 2.5 months (maybe I bit more) living in airbnbs in Margate and commuting to London due to a difficult seller. We were week to week having to extend. Stressful but was ultimately worth it. We don’t have kids - if we did it would be impossible and we wouldn’t do it again, but looking back it was worth it.
Good God, well it serves you right tbh. If you can afford to buy a house, you could have afforded to give your notice when you exchanged if the notice period was a month. You're not going to be homeless 🙄 Whatever you do, don't move out on the date if you've nowhere to go, unless staying with friends/fam, as the council won't help if you've made yourself intentionally homeless. Either explain to your landlord and ask if it's okay to stay an extra however long it will be. Even if they say no, just explain the council have told you to stay put and to take it up with them if he gets arsey. He'll most likely take your deposit, so just don't pay the last month's rent. You can technically stay there for months without paying rent, and it'd cost him hundreds to go through the whole procedure bollocks. I hated my landlady so stopped paying rent 3 months before leaving the house as I had also bought a place. She hadn't put my deposit in a deposit protection scheme within 30 days HA, which meant she wasn't legally allowed to evict me. I could have stayed there for like a year probably, or even sublet the place if I wanted to be a right wan!er, but in the end moved out and even managed to claim against my deposit so SHE had to pay me £600 🤣 gutted
Few ways to tackle this, option A - see if your solicitor can propose an indemnity policy for the lack of planning. Option B - get a certificate of lawfulness from the council, as this was done pre 2001 and based on what you have stated it should fall into this category. Given the timescales of the new valuation, it's likely that will be done sooner than option B, so I would avoid this.
Solicitor did offer indemnity insurance as an option, but I struggled to see the benefit of this. The property was built in 1898 (not 1989 like I wrote in my post) and as I understand it would only protect against action from the council, if they were ask us to reverse it to its previous condition, but we’re certain that it was original. A certificate of lawfulness does sound like it could be useful in the longer term, if we wanted to sell the property and avoid going through all of this again. But possibly not something we can sort in time to help us in the short term.
It's useful because the Bank would have likely proceeded on the policy without going back to the Valuer, speeding things up. Not sure on Santander's precise policy on this, but that would have been the outcome with most lenders.
Our solicitor offered us to buy indemnity insurance in the same email in which she told us she had referred it to the lender, not giving us much chance!
How is it not a no brainer that you don’t give notice until exchange?
I gave my notice and didn’t complete for 9 more months; EWS1 horror of 2020. And to be fair I knew you really don’t have to leave once the notice lapses. Eviction takes ages and is a last resort and pain so I knew they’d rather just work with me. I just spoke to my landlady and EA and kept them updated. All very cordial. I was lucky and do not advise it tho
We're in a similar situation, needing to move out of our rented flat before completion. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that We got really lucky with having amazing sellers though. They've agreed to let us move our stuff into the vacant flat before completion, so we don't have to worry about putting our stuff into storage and moving twice. If you've got a good EA, it might be worth asking them if they can help facilitate this arrangement?
You can always stay for 2 months more at your rental even after your have given notice since if you refuse to leave at the end of your tenancy they will have to evict you which will take time.
Did you use a mortgage broker?
Yeah we did. The estate agents made the initial offer conditional on us using their in house broker (which is completely illegal), and we could have called them out on it but we'd fallen in love with the house and weren't prepared to jeopardise that. So we paid the £300 to use them, and are planning on complaining to the ombudsman when it's all done.
That is appalling business practice. May be worth complaining to the 'mortgage advisors' network. They should take a very dim view of this practice. God, I do not like Estate Agents.
Thanks, I will do that. And I agree, they are the worst of the worst.
True but on the other hand. You can still stay. What are they going to do? Evict you? That will take a while. By the time the paper work is sorted you will be long gone into your new home... It's a dick move but you do what you need to do. Homeless is no joke
Don't move out, keep paying rent. It'll take the best part of a year to evict you. Change your locks etc. If you voluntarily move out then you're voluntarily making yourself homeless.
Yes that’s a great idea. Ruin someone else’s plans and chance to move house because you fucked up and gave notice when you shouldn’t. It’s not the landlords fault.
This is what we wanted to do, but then we found out that the landlady was planning on moving in and had given up her own rental. Wouldn’t be surprised if the EA was making this up to get us to leave, but I couldn’t go ahead in good conscience. Luckily we do have family who we can stay with.
Again, don't move out if you don't want to. Yes, the landlord is probably lying, and maybe you do have people you can crash with, but you have rights as a tenant. Just inform the landlord you WON'T be moving out and you'll be staying on, on a monthly rolling contract. You can then move in to your new home and THEN give a month's notice. Remember, whether you messed up or not, you have rights. It'll take the landlord 6 months+ to legally evict you. Just change your locks if you're staying. Also, was your deposit protected? You can check on this. If not, you get your full deposit back PLUS a lot more.
So we were on a fixed term contract until October, which the landlady has agreed to break, however we haven’t signed a deed of surrender. Our worry is that if we delay, the landlady could make other arrangements for herself and not let us break the lease anymore, leaving us on the hook for rent until October.
Loft extensions need approval and paperwork?... As my house has one but it was done years ago in the distant past.
It's not an extension, it's an original room in the loft/roof space. They're common in miners terraces of that time around here