Why is my house sale taking so long? A seller’s perspective

Buying and selling a house can be a frustrating process. It is our job as solicitors to explain each step of the way to our clients so that they can manage their expectations and fully appreciate the process that needs to take place before a property can be sold. After all, this will be the most expensive purchase most people ever make in their lives so the due diligence process is likely to be very thorough in most cases.

The purpose of this blog is to look at it from a seller’s perspective and to try and give an explanation as solicitors as to why sellers sometimes get frustrated with the conveyancing process and hopefully it will go someway to alleviate that frustration.

Buyer’s control

When a property is sold it is the buyer that has to do the due diligence. In Wales and England, we do not have a system like Scotland does where as soon as an offer is made a buyer is committed to buying that property subject to a survey. Instead, any party can pull out right until the eleventh hour before contracts are exchanged. The buyer is the one financing the purchase and often the case will be that they will have to obtain a mortgage as well which adds a further complication.

 “Buyer beware” – this is the basis in which the conveyancing process works in Wales and England. The risk is on the buyer, it is up to them to ask questions to the seller, to undertake the due diligence and to investigate the property. It is not for the seller to do the investigation for the buyer. So, if the buyer does not ask a particular question about a certain matter, then there is no comeback on the seller. The only time that would happen is if the sellers deliberately misled a buyer. With this in mind, it is logical therefore that a buyer will take time to undertake that due diligence and that will involve having surveys undertaken, investigating the Land Register title, undertaking searches, etc. As a result, it is the buyer who dictates the pace of any sale. Often we hear of transactions where sellers are making demands from the outset that certain timescales need to achieved but, the reality of the situation is that they themselves have very little influence over how quickly a sale can progress because parties are entirely dependant on the buyer undertaking that due diligence, the quicker that is undertaken the faster the process will move. This is one area that can cause frustration because sellers are completely dependent on another party moving the matter along.

Lenders

More often than not, particularly with younger buyers, a mortgage will need to be obtained to fund the purchase. This adds a third party into the transaction and therefore is another factor that can add time.

A buyer will often have a mortgage in principle when making an offer on a property and when the offer has been accepted, the matter will then go to survey. Time is then taken for the surveyor to attend the property and if the surveyor picks up issues further investigations such as other specialist reports i.e., wood worm, timber, damp, etc, will need to be undertaken. This can all add time to the process.

In addition, particularly during the pandemic we saw there were a number of delays in lenders getting Mortgage Offers sent to the buyer. The time this blog was written in April 2022, matters had settled down and Mortgage Offers appeared to be issued at reasonable timescales again.

However, what often causes significant delay is if a Mortgage Offer is issued and there might a specific clause requiring further investigation or alternatively there may be errors in the Mortgage Offer such as, the address being incorrect, or there is a particular mortgage condition that had not been anticipated by the buyer and their broker. To use a recently example we came across, a home buying company had purchased the property less than 6 months before selling it and the buyer then proceeded to obtain a mortgage against the property being unaware that when obtaining the mortgage it was a condition of the lender that this need to be reported to them and they have to approve this arrangement before proceeding. This caused considerable delays as the lender wanted full details about the seller before giving it’s consent.  These type of unforeseen circumstances can cause delays.

Third parties

As a rule of thumb, the more parties that you have in a transaction, the more complex it becomes and the slower the process. This is no different in conveyancing.

A simple cash purchase between a buyer and a seller with no other third party involvement will invariably proceed quicker than the same transaction involving lenders who may instruct their own solicitors and therefore, introduce another third party, additional surveyors further specialist reports and of course the most obvious one, a multiple property chain. The more parties involved the more separate instructions are needed to be taken from each which slows the process down.

As a seller, your job is essentially to have the Contract paperwork issued and then answer any questions in respect of the property. That in its very basic form is all that you have to do. In contract, a buyer may have their own related sale with that transaction to deal with and another set of solicitors acting for their buyers, they may then have a lender who may well instruct their own solicitors as well as a separate surveyor. The buyer having to liaise with each of those will add time and complexity to the transaction which is another reason why matters sometimes slow down as a result.

Searches

During the pandemic, searches were a major issue taking, particularly In the Gwynedd area, in excess of 2 months at times to be returned. Matters have significantly improved, and we are heading back to pre-pandemic timescales. Searches on average are taking between 4-7 weeks to arrive.

The searches consist of three parts – An Environmental Search, a Water Search and Local Authority Search. Other searches can be undertaken but they are the three basic main searches.

Environmental Searches usually come back within 48 hours, Water Searches take between 2-3 weeks and Local Authority Searches are the ones that take between 4-7 weeks in Gwynedd. Each local authority will vary, for example you can undertake the same Local Authority Search in Tower Hamlets in London and it will come back within 10 days on average, it just depends on where the property is located.

We often have sellers stating, “why can’t a buyer get an indemnity insurance policy instead of searches”. The problem is that an indemnity insurance policy, whilst it will cover the contents of the search, does not tell you what is actually in the search so whilst having the policy provides a degree of protection, it is far more advisable to have the searches themselves undertaken so that proper due diligence takes place. In addition, many lenders require that these searches are undertaken so if the buyer is obtaining a mortgage, they may not have the option of an indemnity policy. Each lender has their own criteria but again, lenders would expect proper due diligence to be undertaken. As stated, it is the buyer after all who is at risk here not the seller, so it is not unreasonable to expect them to want to undertake proper due diligence.

Chains

We are probably stating the obvious with this point, but when there is a multiple party chain, which we have already mentioned earlier in the blog, it does cause delays.

It is a case of having to get everybody on that chain in the same position, often having multiple parties of multiple solicitors involved which goes back to our earlier point about the more parties that are involved the slower the process generally is and as a result, this is another factor that can significantly slow down the sale process. 

What can I do as the seller to speed up to the process?

The seller has two key jobs, as stated, firstly to make sure the Contract paperwork is issued promptly and secondly to answer questions.

The first point will be handled by your solicitors so it is important that a solicitor has the information necessary, i.e., full details of the property, so that they can issue the Contract paperwork as soon as the particulars are received from the estate agent. As a seller, you have two documents which form part of the Contract paperwork, the Property Information Form and the Fittings and Contents Form. These will usually be given to you by your solicitor from the outset so if you can ensure they are completed and returned to your solicitors with no gaps, then this will help save time. If you have questions about completing the form, we advise you to contact your solicitors straight away as they can usually deal with those over the phone, it is the same form for each transaction after all. In addition, if you have any documents available such as, planning documents, building regulations consent, gas certificates, electrical certificates, guarantees for the windows, etc, you should also give as much of those papers to your solicitors as possible. The more information you can provide your solicitors from the outset the less likely there are to be questions raised by the buyer’s solicitors later on. Missing paperwork is probably the number one reason, in the writer’s experience, as to why questions are raised by buyer’s solicitors.

The second way you can help your solicitors is that when questions are asked by the buyer’s solicitors that you provide detailed, clear and concise responses to those questions when they are referred to you by your solicitor. We often hear of sellers becoming frustrated with questions raised by buyer’s solicitors, which is understandable because they are eager for matters to proceed swiftly but remember, the buyer’s solicitors are only doing their job by raising these questions, it is their responsibility to help the buyer undertake due diligence on the property, if they fail to do this, they themselves will be open to a negligence claim from the client.

Conclusion

We hope that this blog goes someway to help explain the conveyancing process and why transactions take time. Buying a house is seldom straightforward but it need not be highly stressful either, if every party in the chain knows where they stand and what they need to do to achieve completion then overall it will result in a smoother, more efficient transaction.