House Buying

[watervole]

 All going manic now.

My son and his fiancee had their offer accepted yesterday, so they're just starting the applying for mortgage, finding solicitor stages, etc.

The house my daughter is buying is being sold as part of an estate, so there is no information provided on fixtures and fittings or anything else.

We've just ordered electrical and gas safety inspections.  Also need to check for lead pipes as the house is of an age where that needs considering.

We had a survey done which threw up nothing unexpected.  It's clear that the surveyor we used has a sideline in acting as an agent for you with estate agents and getting a commission for haggling the price down.  (he advertises the service in his report, and gives a low valuation on the property to encourage you to do this).  However, all the things that he flagged as lowering the value of the property, like dated kitchen fittings, are things that we were perfectly well aware of and were not concerned about.  

The basic structure and the roof are in very good condition and that's what we wanted to know.  (there's asbestos on the garage roof, but my daughter had already spotted that and will remove it in due course - as long as we don't drill holes in it, it isn't an immediate danger.)

So, one sale and two purchases on the go.

By rights, I should be going mildly insane, but selling my mother-in-law's house (which did drive me insane) taught me a lot about the process and what to do to keep things moving and how to spot when things are breaking down.  Hence follow up phone call to estate agent to see how our buyers are getting along with their mortgage application.  They should be ringing me back this afternoon.

Comments

[ranunculus]

That sounds like a very exciting chapter of several lives!!
Interesting that here an individual goes and gets "pre-qualified" for a loan before ever looking at a house (or they should). In the extremely fast moving real estate market here in California buyers need every advantage they can get. Pre-qualification lets the seller know that a buyer can, in the eyes of the bank, afford the house they are bidding on. It also shortens the time it takes to get an actual loan.
Hope all goes well!

[watervole]

Henry was in the process of getting a pre-qualified loan when he made the offer. He knows he will have no trouble getting a mortgage as inheritance money means he can put down a large deposit which makes him very low risk in terms of loan to value ratio.

I've learnt not to trust pre-qualified loans - they break down when bidding wars happen. We had a buyer for my mother-in-laws house who had a pre-approved mortgage. They bid beyond the limit of their loan (and the solicitors failed to pick this up) and had to drop six months later admitting they couldn't do it.

I also learned never to sell to overseas' buyers. They have all sorts of additional problems.

[oreouk]

The way house sales work here in the UK is entirely insane. In theory a house sale can be done in a few weeks, but in reality most take months and either party can back out for any reason with no financial repurcussions right up until the last minute when contracts are exchanged, including the vendor after the purchaser has already paid for surveys.

[watervole]

Some of it makes sense.

I can see the point of all the enhanced identification checks and limits on cash payments. Money laundering is far more of an issue than when I last bought a house.

On the other hand, we're having to pay out for gas and electrical safety checks and I really can't see why the seller shouldn't have to produce things like that before being allowed to put the property on the market.

[oreouk]

I would agree that some parts of the process make sense, so i was clearly being a bit excessive to claim that it is entirely insane.

I think the bit that most frustrates me is the time that solicitors and estate agents take to do things - they are being paid a very handsome fee (fixed IIRC, so not enhanceable by taking ages) and instead of getting on with the jobs which should take barely any time they take forever and you have to speed things up by chasing them or by discussing things directly with the other party (or parties, in a chain situation). There ought to be a financial penalty to the Estate Agent or Solicitor every time a party to a sale/purchase has to do part of their job for them due to them taking too long to get around to it.

Also the ability for a purchase to crash down after you've spent money getting all these things done at the whim of the vendor (it's legit for a house purchase to collapse due to the surveys and what-not bringing up issues) and with no financial consequence to the vendor. I have a friend who has just managed to purchase a new place after 2 previous sales vanished out from under her feet for no given reason, after she'd spent a good chunk of money on the process in each case.