how long to move

You have done well. Our last move took nearly 6 months from start to finish and was a saga of crossed lines, estate agents misleading our buyer and at one point, two different families both thinking they were buying our house

Well, we exchanged last Friday and are due to complete and move this Friday. It will be exactly 10 weeks since we first viewed the new property and 8 weeks and 4 days since mine went on the market. We have been packing up steadily over the past 6 weeks, but now my stress level are increasing on a daily basis......never again!

Moving house is the next stressful thing after bereavement and divorce. One time the seller pulled out a week before we were due to move. We heard later that they put their property on the market several times to check the value. Another time we had two potential buyers on the hook but ended up selling to a third.

Wow, what a mix of experiences! It's a wonder we ever try to move at all given the pitfalls that can occur. At the moment we are just keeping everything crossed. Everyone in the chain seems to be keen to progress and we are chasing regularly (but not to a nuisance level I hope ... just enough to keep our names in the frame) to ensure that our file stays near the top. Thank you for all the input.

How do you find the best solicitors Kazza? For one move we went with the ones the estate agent recommended thinking they'd work together and it was a big mistake. My mother used a pin in the directory method and had excellent service! Is it just down to chance?

A lot of solicitors seem to work determinedly through everything in order. They send out an enquiry about when the boiler was last serviced, your file then goes to the bottom of the heap and doesn't get looked at again until it reaches the top regardless of whether the reply came back by return and the next query could have been looked at the same day. That wouldn't be fair. Unless they've been nagged. Then things overtake.

We found it an advantage to be in touch with our buyers and vendors. We've been told this is illegal but it means you can work directly and sort out queries before they become hitches.

I am sure you will get responses to this, but there have also been previous threads on this subject, so if you trawl through the past threads on House and Home you will find them.

Does anyone have experience of selling a regular flat and moving to a retirement flat? I've heard all sorts of things about retirement flats, some good and some less so. Has anyone done this then regretted it? Or been pleasantly surprised?

I work for a firm of solicitors doing residential conveyancing. There really can be no guarantees as to a timescale when it comes to buying and selling houses. I would advise people to avoid conveyancing "firms" at all costs, they are a nightmare. Of course there are also bad Solicitors, try and ask around for recommendations. Some mortgage companies can also be difficult. The timescale for a local search (which you must have if you are getting a mortgage) can vary between Local Authorities. On a personal note I sold a house that I rented out to cash buyer who was also buying it as an investment property. Only 2 people in the chain, one property, no mortgage and it still took 3 months!

12 weeks is what they estimate now.

This thread is frightening me.....we have been packing up for 6 weeks, there are boxes everywhere, we have thrown stuff away and bought new stuff. Our buyers say they are ready to move, as are their first time buyers. Our vendor says he wants to move asap and we want to move. The solicitors have their searches, draft contracts have been signed, removals have been pencilled in, curtains have been taken down, beds dismantled, oven cleaned, under stairs cupboard cleared....what could possibly go wrong????

When we sold our large house five & half years ago from going on the market to moving out was 7 weeks, our buyers were being pushed by their first time buyers who wanted to be in before Christmas & we hadn't found anywhere so were going to rent as we were moving area. As soon as we had a firm offer we started looking in our preferred area & found a lovely Park Home, no Solicitor involved just a few forms to fill in so we had a week in a holiday flat close to where we were moving to.Stressful but at least over & done with quickly.

After DH died I put our Home on the market & quickly found a buyer but they had trouble selling their property, after 13 months I was approached by a cash buyer, 3 weeks & I again moved without buying a property. I went to stay with my DD (I was moving nearer her), 4 days after leaving my Home I had an offer accepted on another Park Home but the complication was that Solicitor was dealing with sale (part of Deceased Estate). 6 weeks later I moved in on a temporary Tenancy (with small amount of furniture left in property!!) it was an existance as I wanted my own furniture & a proper bed. My furniture remained in store for a further month until I could pay for property & move in properly. That move was more stressful than our previous one but I'm happy, settled, love the area & live about 10 miles from my DD. No plans to ever move again.

I have moved many times. My only advice would be. Get the agent on your side and deliver document to and from the solicitor, if you can. Our last move took 6 weeks as the owners of the house we are in now, wanted to go to Australia on holiday and I wasn't prepared to wait for exchange and completion until after they got back. Our estate agent was amazing and so was our conveyancer.

It's never taken me less than three months and what with unexpected delays, lost documents, a hysterical buyer and serious illness of a buyer's buyer, it can drag on for longer. All very annoying and if you're at the most vulnerable end of the chain it's almost enough to have you sitting in a corner, rocking back and forth and gibbering.
Moving house is definitely not my favourite 'thing to do.'

I am sure when we first bought a house there was a long gap between exchanging contracts and completing, so you had time when you knew everything was fixed, and could arrange utilities, removals etc with reasonable notice. This gap seems to have got shorter and shorter. A neighbour last year was near breakdown packing and unnpacking, booking and cancelling removals, because of last minute delays at the hands of their solicitors.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but we were in the same position as you recently but 3 weeks ago our buyer changed her mind and withdrew her offer. However the vendors of where we wanted to buy said it was OK as they hadn't been able to find anything suitable so were happy for extra breathing space. Last week they too changed their minds and decided not to sell!!! Grrrrrr, back to square one ?

It took 3 months to sell our house

Our recent move took about 4 months from when we accepted our buyers offer to actual completion date. We bought a new build, so no chain there, just a delay as someone on site "forgot" to arrange supply of services, gas water etc!!! Just as well, as we were at the end of a complicated chain with six others, one of whom was particularly pedantic and used every delaying tactic in the book - even down to having the garden soil analysed! Good luck, hope it all goes smoothly for you, i know how nerve wrecking it can be!

We sold our house 2 days after it came on the market in October and we moved in December! House we were buying was
empty and people buying ours were being pushed by their buyer. It was frighteningly fast.

Has anyone experience of selling in Scotland and buying in England? We're doing so in the next year or so, hopefully. The concern is that the Scottish system gives us, quite early in the process, a definite, binding date when the sale is completed. This is good because we will know how much we have to spend, and when, but less so in that there is no wiggle room on moving out date. We think we're going to have to rent in between to manage the process but really don't want to. Any advice?

Dream on, since when has a house move been painless and stress free. Work on 12 weeks, any less will be a bonus, anything more will be stressful. Good Luck.

The answer is as long as a piece of string!

It all depends on so many factors; the personalities of the peoeple involved, how they paying for the house (cash/mortgage), the chain, or not on their current house, how competent and active their solicitor is. Within our family chains have varied in length from 3 weeks to 9 months.

We moved last year - the house went on the market beginning of July 2015, we accepted an offer beginning of November and completed 7th March 2016 and went in to a rental property for a few months as our house wasn't ready and we didn't want to lose the sale. Hope all goes smoothly for you.

I was an Estate Agent for many years- the longest move I ever had was 15 months. The seller stayed with the buyer through all sorts of problems as the house was empty & they liked her.

The speediest was 6 weeks- another empty house & cash buyers.

Good luck- In those days (80s-90s)the agent did a lot of the leg work & worked WITH local solicitors to ensure a smooth process- they don't seem to do much at all these days. We very often got flowers & wine etc from clients for the work we put in- I worked for independant companies never a chain!

We put our house on the market on 26th November, the buyer wanted to be in by Christmas, we were going on holiday to South Africa on 10th December for 3 weeks, so.....we moved out on 9th December. We moved into a rented house on 2nd January.