How long will it take?

These are the Government's figures for the time it took people to move into a property from the date the offer was accepted. (2004/05)

• Less than three months - 40% (34% in London).
• Three to six months - 49% (53% in London).
• Six to nine months - 8% (10% in London).
• Nine months or longer - 3% (4% in London).

These are pretty appalling statistics.

It is not our experience. We expect to push a deal through much more quickly than this. Really only 6 weeks should be needed in a normal case – 4 weeks to exchange contracts, and 2 weeks to complete.

Once your offer on a property has been accepted, you remain at risk of the seller pulling out until exchange of contracts. So you will naturally want to reduce that period as much as you can. In a perfect world, it would normally take about four weeks. There is no element in the property buying process which needs to take longer than four weeks in theory. Your mortgage offer and the local authority search, which are traditionally delaying factors, should come through within that period. So why do delays occur? The cause of delay is usually human failings which could perfectly well be avoided. These are the usual culprits.

The sellers only involve solicitors when the deal is agreed. Ideally the day a deal is agreed, the sellers' solicitors should send out a complete pack of papers to your solicitors. But this rarely happens because the sellers only instruct thier solicitors when the deal is agreed. if only they had done it when the property was first marketed, the solicitors could have got all the papers together including questionnairs the sellers have to complete about the property. Two weeks could have been saved.

The seller doesn’t get documents from third parties. The seller may have to get information from third parties, such as landlords, managing agents, or the local council. If you are selling a flat, you have to provide three years’ worth of service charge accounts, a copy of the current buildings insurance policy, and some information about future planned works at the building. The sellers could arrange all of this well in advance, but often they don't do it until well into the transaction. The reason is usually that they didn't know they had to do it. But if they had only instructed their solicitors well in advance and asked what was needed, they would have found out in time.

Delays by landlords etc. There are people involved in the process who have no particular interest in how it goes. For example, if you are buying a flat, the transaction requires that the landlord or managing agents provide copies of service charge accounts and the buildings insurance policy, and that they answer some questions about future plans for the property. They have no real motive to sort this out quickly. It is always worth while for the seller to organise this personally, and if necessary pick things up by hand to avoid such delays.

Delays in the chain. Another source of third-party delay is anyone else in the chain of transactions linked to your purchase. If you are selling a property, you are dependent on your buyer, and the people he is selling to down the chain. The same applies to the property your seller is hoping to buy and other parties up the chain. You can't exchange contracts until everyone in the chain is ready.