Impact of COVID-19 on our purchase

Like many others, COVID-19 also caused delays to our already slow property transaction. Lockdown happened just as we finally reached a point where there were no enquiries outstanding on the legal documents! Just wanted to share the issues that we faced.

There was minimal disruption to our solicitor as they were quickly able to set up working remotely. They were great at keeping us updated and helping us chase the other parties.

We were waiting to hear back from the lender on a query and because of COVID-19, it took longer than normal.  It was a stressful time as we were nearing the expiry date of our mortgage offer. Our solicitor informed us that because of COVID-19, the lender had flagged that the drawdown of funds would take 10 working days instead of five.  This meant that even if our solicitor initiated the drawdown request straight away, if it did indeed take 10 working days, our mortgage offer would have expired during that processing time.

At this point, we called the mortgage adviser at Barclays and he was able to help us to get an extension to our mortgage offer. He flagged that as we had not agreed an exchange date, he did not think it would be possible to have a long extension. We informed him that we were planning to complete and exchange on the same day but because of the outstanding query with Barclays, we were unable to agree an exchange and completion date with the developer’s solicitor. 

In the end, we obtained a two week extension from the lender but it was a tight timeline given the COVID-19 lockdown. Our solicitor agreed a date to exchange and complete with the developer’s solicitor which was one week before the expiry of our mortgage offer. This meant it would leave us some time in case of any issues. It finally felt like things were falling into place!

Another issue was that we needed to find a witness to sign our lease! This was troublesome as we were in lockdown but luckily a kind neighbour helped us out.

Previously, we had paid the deposit by telegraphic transfer to our solicitor at the bank branch but we weren’t able to do this during lockdown and so we had to check with the solicitor what alternative methods they wanted us to use. In the end, we paid the remaining funds via online banking.

Our solicitor also flagged there would be delays after completion with registering the title as the Land Registry was working on reduced service.

Hope COVID-19 hasn’t caused too many issues and delays for you!

Jess