Things are horrendous in the market place. A purchaser has no certainty that they will have funds to complete until the loan cheque actually issues - which is very late in the day. It makes a lot of sense therefore for a purchaser to make a contract subject to the loan cheque issuing. This, however, is truly awful for a vendor. There is no binding contract in place right until the very end so how can they possibly make any plans for renting or buying anywhere until the purchaser's loan cheque issues? And at the stage that that happens, the purchaser will be pushing to complete the deal within days. Think about it, the money is lying in the solicitor's client account making heaps of interest for the solicitor!
A vendor has a choice: insist on binding contracts being in place or, lose what may be the only purchaser there. Its stark. On any deal that I currently have on my desk, there are no anxious underbidders waiting in the wings!
Its all very much a trust situation now - and most people are sort of desperate anyway so extremely unreliable in that regard.