Selling my UK home

Hello,

My husband and I are in the process of selling our house here in Warwickshire; we are also in the process of getting a green card for my husband.

Is it me or is anybody else going absolutely INSANE as well trying to sell their house?  As if the stress of the I-130 isn't enough to deal with!   

I've been here for eight years and when we bought our house back then, we were "cash" buyers and didn't have any complications.  I guess I was "blissfully" ignorant back then.  But the delays, lack of communication and the whole lack of any system is something I'm not coping with very well right now.

Any moral support would be greatly appreciated!

Hang in there!  We were lucky enough to dump ours pretty quickly - even before our interview  (no questions asked)  You have a little time on your side - the right buyer will come! 

Thanks for your words of encouragement, Missy!

It's so hard making such important plans, yet waiting to get your buyers to instruct their searchers and surveys before getting a contract.

We put the house on the market in April and had two offers after a week.  We choose the people who were in a more proceedable position.  Then after a month, their purchasers pulled out so the sale fell through.

Our house went back on the market and again, we had two offers and chose the people in a better position.  They happen to live in our village...  And now, three weeks later, we are still waiting for them to get the survey done.  The estate agents aren't very proactive.  I just want to get the contract signed and know what timescales we're working with.

With any luck, we might actually complete here and get my husband's interview at the Embassy within a couple of weeks of each other.  But until we have confirmation of either, I toss and turn at night because my brain won't switch off!

Oh well.  At least I'll have interesting stories to tell when we're back in Chicago!  Nobody back home really seems to believe me when I tell them how the property market works here!

When do you go back to the US?  Thanks again for your words of encouragement!  I'm sure it will all fall into place eventually...

Kellie

three weeks later, we are still waiting for them to get the survey done.  The estate agents aren't very proactive. 

How about offering an incentive, like a 200 pound discount, if they get it done within x amount of time?

When do you go back to the US? 

We moved back the 9th of May and the whole repat process was worth it - hang in there!!!

How about offering an incentive, like a 200 pound discount, if they get it done within x amount of time?

This is what we did, and it worked on our feet-dragging buyers.

Thanks to both of you for your advice.  I think it's definitely worth trying.  We've already been on the phone with the estate agent this morning......

I'll let you know how things go, if I don't go insane first!

Kellie

Good luck Kellie. We're also trying to sell our UK home at the moment, and no joy as yet. Not a sausage.

Very disheartening. We're all ready to up and leave, but this one thing is stopping us. If we'd realised just what a nightmare this part of the process would have been, we'd have put the house on the market BEFORE I got my Green Card. In comparison to selling a house, the  GC interview day is easy-peesy-lemon-squeezie.

Thanks for your support!

We put our house on the market and filed the I-130 at the same time, back in April.  I think what brings on the anxiety is that these are things that you don't have a lot of control over.  Do you get the green card first then sell?  Sell first and then get the green card?  Or try to coordinate both around the same time?  The truth is, there's no telling how it's going to go!

I'm sure that your house will sell soon.  Are you in London?  We're in a small Warwickshire village and our buyers actually live in the village.  Yesterday, after no joy with the estate agent, my husband just went over to our buyers' house for a chat.  We know them so felt we'd throw protocol out of the window before the estate agent actually kills the deal because of his inability to chase things up.

This turned out to be a good move because the buyers were getting frustrated with the agents as well and were going to come up and see us!  We were actually able to get information about their situation.  A little information goes a long way.  So hopefully it will progress now.

How long have your house been on the market?  Have you had lots of viewings?  Hang in there; the right buyers will walk through your door.   Where are you going in the States?

Good luck and thanks again!

Kellie

That's the problem we had. We thought selling would be the easy part - oh how we laugh at our naivety now!

We're in Staffordshire, and the market isn't exactly buoyant at the moment. In over two months of having the house on the market at a fair price, we've had a grand total of 3 viewings. It's very depressing. We've already dropped the price once, and I'm damned if I'm going to drop it again - we've got little things called credit cards to pay off before we leave!

We've already dumped one estate agent, and are now with two, neither of which seem to be actually...oh....SELLING the FRICKIN' house!!

As for our eventual destination - Houston, to my in-laws initially. Which should be fine, as they've just started renting a decent-sized house. It'll have to be, considering there'll be them, us, their 3 dogs and our 2 cats! Fun fun fun!

So where are you going?

I completely understand your frustrations of selling house.  It winds up taking over your life!  It gets even more upsetting when it seems like everybody else around you sells theirs without a hitch.  Our neighbours, for examples, are moving in as I am writing to you now!  I'm telling you, I could go on and on about the anxieties of selling, but I'd hate to scare off other people who might read this!

Are you near Stoke?  My husband used to run a warehouse operation at Wedgewood  (he's in logistics) and had the oh-so-joyous commute on the M-6 which was particularly horrible on Fridays...

I had to laugh at your pending stay with your in-laws.  We will be experiencing something similar, only this side of the Atlantic with my in-laws.  Tony's parents live just outside of Stratford and have kindly offered a roof over our heads while things come together.  We have two boys (ages 6 and 2)  a cat and an obnoxious Labrador Retriever.  To make it even better, my in-laws house is immaculate and decorated with antiques and figurines!  Help!

We'll be heading to Chicago, which is my home and where Tony and I met when he working there.  He left corporate life several years ago and has recently been collaborating with former US collegues.  We thought that with what house prices have done here (assuming one can sell!) and the exchange rate, it would be a good time to move.  So Tony is working on a project now with these guys....

I know that it's easier to say hang in there than to actually do it; everybody has been telling me that.  But you and your wife have our understanding and support!  @!*##* estate agents!

Kellie

@!*##* estate agents!

I hear ya, Sister!


Leaving this thread to my hubby (Big Ridge). Just wanted to send my good vibes to you for a quick sale. Shall we share some real estate mojo? We can use all the help we can get!

Sarah

Well we're not selling a house but this is for you guys...

MOJO!!! MOJO!!! MOJO!!!

(Is it working?) 

Kellie,

We're down the road from Stoke, in Cannock. In fact I was born in Burslem, and raised in Kidsgrove and Congleton (both very close to Stoke itself). I sympathise entirely with your husband regarding the horrendous commute up and down the M6 - I do it myself for a short stretch from Cannock to Wolverhampton every day (arguably the worst stretch of motorway in the country).

In any other situation I'm sure we wouldn't be bothered about the length of time it's taking to sell - after all, most NORMAL people are buying another house, not moving halfway round the world! But we're not normal people. Far from it, in fact. It does seem like the estate agents couldn't give a monkeys though.

Brooke, keep chanting. What with you doing that, my MIL doing her thing for us, and my Grand-MIL working whatever dark magic she's got going on, we're bound to sell. I just don't want to know how many sacrificial chickens/goats/sheep there are. OK?

I'll be sending the vibes to you and hope that it works.  Nobody should have to go through the pain of selling their house here.

We've been a bit distracted the last two days.  Knocking on our buyers door and cutting out the agent seems to have done some good as we got a last minute appointment for the valuation, which was carried out yesterday afternoon.  We were expecting a full structural.  We're not complaining by any means, but we're just a bit perplexed that it was a basic mortgage valuation on a house of our age.  I think we've become very cynical and paranoid!  Every step seems to bring out a new set of anxieties.

On another happier note, I'm going to be visiting the potteries up in your area with a couple of friends on Saturday.  I've never been there before so I'm looking forward to looking around for bargains.  I don't know which ones potteries we're actually going to visit; I'm just tagging along...

You guys will sell, repatriate, invade the relatives and after it's all said and done, we'll all wonder what all the worry was about!

To anybody who ever is or has experienced the nightmare of selling their house in England:

 We still have not exchanged contracts on the house.

I'm getting really stressed out now.  Everytime that I think we just might be getting to the point where we can exchange, it seems it doesn't happen. 

I really hate to complain about things, but I find the whole system here beyond flawed.  It seems to me that nobody does what they say they will do and that nobody has any initiative to keep things moving! We're constantly the ones making phone calls and chasing people up.  Yet, things just drift, drift, drift!!!!!!!!! It's always niggling in the back of mind that our buyers might pull out, as this has already happened to us once. 

Am I losing my mind?  Am I the only sane person amongst these estate agents, solicitors and buyers?