How long after signing contracts?

Hi folks,

Just wondering, once the contracts are signed, is there anything else left to do, or how long can we expect to wait before we get the keys?

Many thanks for all answers.

Petal said:

Hi folks,

Just wondering, once the contracts are signed, is there anything else left to do, or how long can we expect to wait before we get the keys?

Many thanks for all answers.

Click to expand...

Well, assuming that you have your mortgage protection etc covered, there shouldn't be much left to do. The date you can actually move in should have been specified in the contract. Also, you might want to arrange a pre-closing inspection before you actually close, to ensure that the vendors haven't left all their crap in the place (that's if you've stated in the contract that it's to be moved out as a condition of the sale).

Thanks for that. I am a bit confused about all the things that have to happen next. I got a letter from the solicitor and I've got to go and sign the loan offer. Do I need to have the insurances in place for that already, or does that only have to be in place for signing the contracts. And the closing date, is that something you arrange with the vendor through their estate agent? Sorry for all the silly questions, but it's not very transparent....

Firstly congrats on having bought and signed contracts - I have read some of your posts as you went through the process. Yes - you are right it is not very transparent and it appears to differ depending on the solicitor and estate agent involved. However generally the closing date is arranged between the purchaser and the vendor's solicitor. Don't worry if there is a delay on either side - this frequently happens - it will not fall through at this stage. As regards the loan offer you don't have to have mortgage protection or house insurance in place. However these will have to be in place before the cheque is drawn down from your bank and issued to your solicitor which will happen just before the sale closes.

Thanks Art, so this means I can go and sign the loan offer and while the solicitor does all the searches and stuff I can get the insurance sorted, so when we sign contracts pretty much all is in place and we could close very shortly thereafter? The house we're buying is vacant, so there shoudln't be any delays from the vendor's side (hopefully).

Sorry I thought you had signed - I misunderstood the opening post. Yes sign away - all you need is the loan offer. Get cracking on the insurance and the mortgage protection now though as there can sometimes be inexplicable delays on the part of the insurance companies as you will have read about elsewhere on this site. Yes - you should be able to close very soon after if the house is vacant as it is neither party's interest to be hanging around.

I echo previous posters, and stress that you should get your mortgage protection ASAP. Tell them that you need it sorted yesterday (even if you don't) to try and speed things along. We nearly missed our own draw-down date because of this. AFAIK you can apply for mortgage protection up to 3 months before it goes active.

Great stuff, thanks for all the info. I've made some enquiries regarding insurance, and the best two deals I found were as follows:

We're both smokers (only occasionally really, but can't be considered non-smokers so)

Through insure.ie I got an offer of 985 per year, first year discounted rate 295.77, and then montly rate of 82.16 thereafter (through 123.ie the same comes with a discounted rate of 455.02 in year one)

With independant broker - they don't do discounts but could offer me the same thing for monthly rate of 77.41

So whereas I have an immediate saving with the first one, the latter works out cheaper in the long term (about 1200 over the 34 years).

Any thoughts?

Try labrokers.ie or primafinance.ie for quotes also
I have no affiliation with either company

daithi

Tried both, labrokers is about the same as 123.ie. Primafinance had the lowest annual premium, but don't do discounts in the first year (I think - in the process of checking).