How do I go about buying a cheap house in two weeks?

[digger_R]

Hypothetical question, how could I buy a house or set in motion all the things required to buy a property as I'm going travelling for a while

Any info on where I can look at lists of repo properties would be useful too.

Very general questions but I have little idea of how the housing buying process works.

I seem to remember there were a few mortgage experts on here somewhere too as I could do with some help on that front too.

Edited by digger_R on Wednesday 6th January 18:12

[sday12]

Impossible to actually purchase in two weeks


HTH

[Chris_w666]

Would be impossible to do everything from finding a house onwards. It could be possible, if everything is in place and works perfectly for you, to go from offer accepted to completion in 2 weeks.

If you haven't arranged a mortgage yet and want to leave the country in 2 weeks you have no chance. When we moved last year we had a mortgage in principle agreed for about 3 weeks before getting an offer accepted, it took 4 weeks from then to get into the house and that is because the sellers pushed to be out ASAP and both solicitors were very flexible.

[digger_R]

Assuming finance is available, is there any way I could do it without being present? I assumed there would be some form of standard contract/power of attorney to that effect?

[Chris_w666]

You would need a solicitor to advise you on that, I think signing the contracts etc would be something you need to do with them as a witness though.

[UpTheIron]

If you are a cash buyer, easy to do. If you need a mortgage, no mortgage company is going to let you spend their money without doing some checks on the property first, so it isn't going to happen.

Why the urgency?

[maser_spyder]

sday12 said:

Impossible to actually purchase in two weeks


HTH

S'not.

My record so far for a speedy purchase;

Bought house on Thursday.

Rung mortgage company on Friday (could have done this on Thursday but went to the pub to celebrate). Mortgage company arranged desktop valuation for Monday.

Documents arrived on Saturday morning.

Returned signed docs on Monday.

Mortgage offer came in on Wednesday.

Solicitor completed for us on Friday (although this technically could have been on Wednesday if we had really been in a hurry).

From buying, to picking the keys up, was 7 days and 20 hours.

This was at auction, so all searches and legals had been done already, and I signed the contract on fall of the hammer.

This was all pre-crash, I'm pretty certain the rules will be a lot stricter now.

If you're in a real hurry, buy at auction, where all the hard work has been done. You'll either get 14 or 28 days to complete, or you'll lose your deposit (normally 10%), so there's an incentive to get your finger out!

I've bought a few like this, it's never taken more than 28 days (or I would have lost my deposit!), and normally half this, from fall of hammer to completion.

Edited by maser_spyder on Wednesday 6th January 19:44

[digger_R]

Thanks for the info so far.
Do you know of any sites where I can find auctions coming up in the West Midlands?

[maser_spyder]

digger_R said:

Thanks for the info so far.
Do you know of any sites where I can find auctions coming up in the West Midlands?

eigroup (google it) has all property auctions in the UK, upcoming and historical information.

I used to have a login (it's about £600 a year), but let it lapse as I moved on to other things.

Still, it should have a listing of auctioneers in your area, you can then google them to find websites (and upcoming auctions) direct.

HTH

[Shelsleyf2]

Try this site http://propertyauctionaction.co.uk/ the companies are listed by region. My old man bought by private treaty in one week once. My record was two weeks. Solicitors like to pretend theres lots to do..but mining searches and the like aside it realy can be done in a few busy working days.


Hope it helps...

[Wings]

Shelsleyf2 said:

Try this site http://propertyauctionaction.co.uk/ the companies are listed by region. My old man bought by private treaty in one week once. My record was two weeks. Solicitors like to pretend theres lots to do..but mining searches and the like aside it realy can be done in a few busy working days.


Hope it helps...

Agree, most searches now online.

http://www.propertyauctions.com/

http://www.eigroup.co.uk/property-auctions/

http://www.auction.co.uk/residential/home.asp