Trying to Purchase a Repossessed Maisonette

(Josie Sayz: I have deleted my few rants and have decided to compile my thoughts together in a little blog post. Oh, and to ease confusion, I use flat and maisonette interchangeably.)

It feels like a lifetime ago now, but back in August, I went to look around a maisonette. The area is only two miles away from where I live now. When I first spotted the flat, this particular estate agent wouldn't let me view it without having a meeting with their mortgage advisor. So on a Saturday, in early August, I met the mortgage advisor, who was lovely. He let me know that, at a push, I could afford a property that is a little bit more expensive than my initial budget. After meeting with the mortgage advisor, I was allowed to view the maisonette on the following Wednesday.

I knew that the property needed a lot of renovations, from the pictures, but when I got there, I was so overwhelmed with how much of a disaster it was. From the picture of the front of the maisonettes/flats, it looked as though the property was the one on the left, where the only neighbour directly attached to it was the one downstairs. The communal staircase to the properties was on the right and the property looked to be the one on the outside wall. Well, when I got there, the property that was in the centre of the photograph (which I thought was the one on the outside wall) was not the property that I had the viewing for. The property that was half cut off the photograph was the maisonette that I was looking around. This was  the middle property too, so it had neighbours on either side, which upset me a little, but I thought that it might cost less to heat, being as it was sandwiched between other people. Then, as I looked around the flat, every single room had mould on all four walls and the ceiling. The bathroom and kitchen needed fully ripping out and replacing, as did the floor and every single wall needed plastering. The entire property was unliveable for even rodents. I do not know any carpenters, plumbers, plasterers or anything like that. Although, I like the idea of renovating it exactly as I wanted it, I have no idea how to and the labour costs, in the UK, are more than three times the cost for the new kitchen and the new bathroom combined. I was terrified. My autism struggles with being overwhelmed when I am not in control of things, but the property was cheap, in a nice area, and is the only property I have come across that I could afford in the eighteen months of looking.

So, I viewed the property on a Wednesday. The estate agent who showed me around was on annual leave on Thursday, but she said her colleague was going to ring me on Thursday to get my thoughts and know if I was interested in making an offer. As properties that I can afford are never available in my area and there is no way, as a single female, I am going to live in a rough area, my manager (at the time) helped me to figure out what to say and he let me keep my phone on me all day, so that I could take the phone call. The estate agent did not phone.

I happened to wake up really early on Friday morning, and out of habit, I looked up to see if any properties had gone up for sale in the area, in my budget, and one had. I had a look, but did not think too much about it. I decided to walk to work, it was a 6 mile walk, but I had been trying to walk to work to save money. I had planned to get to work super early, so that I could call the estate agent myself and tell her that I wanted to put in an offer on this falling apart flat. As I was walking to work, I walked down a steep hill to find police and the fire brigade blocking off the road, because the main road and the surrounding areas are almost waist high with water. The bus that I would usually get to work, happened to also pull up and had to let everyone off the bus, because the road was unpassable. The main water pipe to the city centre and the next town over, that I live in, had cracked and all of the water was volcanoing out of the ground. I had a complete meltdown and panic attack, but managed to run back up the hill and half a mile back down the road and just made it, in time, to get a train that got me to work in the nick of time. Due to this happening, I did not get the chance to phone the estate agent.

When I got to work, my manager asked if I had spoken to the estate agent and made an offer on the dilapidated maisonette, and I decided to show him the other maisonette/flat that I had found in the morning. It looked to be in a 1,000 times better condition and it was up for less money. He told me to phone this other estate agent to book a viewing of this other maisonette, so I did. While on the phone to this other estate agent, I found out that this maisonette was the one next door to the one that I just viewed and it was the one that I originally thought that the previous property was – the one that I wanted, without any neighbours on the left or the right. It was almost as though fate wanted me to see this property.

I booked to view this maisonette on the Saturday. While I was waiting outside to view it, I got to speak to one of the neighbours, who gave me all of the gossip with regards to who everyone was and what the two flats were like and which one was worth the money, and which sellers were nice – she was super nice and helpful. There was supposed to be a second person at my viewing, but she did not turn up, so I got to speak to the estate agent by myself. He was very old fashioned and quite cold with me at first, but he warmed to me pretty quickly and he was so nice, in the end, and he told me how to go about making an offer and I got to ask questions that I would never have felt comfortable doing, with someone else there. I actually cried, because I like the flat so much. The bathroom is brand new! The kitchen is decent and just needs cleaning and repainting, and maybe a couple of cupboards put on the walls. The living room an bedroom might need some new laminate flooring, but my manager said that is super cheap to do.

So, I went immediately to the estate agent’s office and made an offer. I found out that the property is a repossession and the bank, who is repossessing the property had said that the sale had to happen within seven to eight weeks or they would pull out. This was super exciting. This meant that the end of week eight was the 12^th October. The bank accepted the offer and for the next eight weeks, I was scared, terrified and super excited all at the same time.

I had terrible luck with getting a solicitor. I used to work at a solicitors who dealt with property purchases, so I enquired there. I had asked for Mr Atkinson, but as he was retiring, he wasn’t taking on anymore clients and he said to ask Neil, who wasn’t interested, because he had to take on some of Mr Atkinson’s work, so he passed me over to Jo, who wasn’t interested, because she had been passed some of Neil’s work, so she passed me over to Kevin, who wasn’t interested, because he had taken on some of Jo’s work and he passed me over to the Stratford-upon-Avon office, who were incredibly rude to me over the phone and made me cry. So I asked my estate agent for advice and he found me a solicitor and I started the process with them, only to be told two weeks later that they were not interested, because it is a leasehold, which they knew in the first place. So, then I had to contact a third solicitors. Thankfully, these solicitors where incredibly helpful and understood that I was now behind and everything needed to be completed really quickly. My solicitor, Gemma, is amazing. She got through all of the paperwork that needed to be completed by my end finished by the 4^th October. I was so incredibly grateful for everything that she did for me. Then, the waiting game started.

Every single week since, and multiple times during the week, my solicitor, Gemma, has emailed me saying that the seller’s solicitors have still not got back to her on things, they are refusing to provide information and are not taking her calls. The person who had been living in the property did not leave it until the weekend of week 12. Then, the seller’s solicitors said that I would not receive the gas or electric service information/pass certificates, so I would have to organise to do this before completion could take place.

I phoned up a gas engineer and an electric engineer, but the nice person, Josh, who I had been dealing with at the estate agents was no longer dealing with my property purchase, because he is only involved at the initial stages. I was passed over to a lady named Gin, who I am starting to believe is not a real person. She never answers my calls, she never returns my calls, she scarcely emails me back. Well, it took four weeks for her to allow the electrician to go to the property. He had to disconnect the electrics, because the fuse box had lots of outdated, fraying parts and there were several lose hanging wires around the property. Now, the gas could not be checked, because the electrics had been disconnected. I arranged for the over £1200 worth of repairs to be carried out to the electrics, because the seller’s bank would not. Then, Gin cancelled the visit, did not tell me, and I had already arranged for the gas engineer to go to the property the following day, having already paid them too. Then, Gin had the nerve to tell me that I was the one holding up the completion of the property, because I didn’t declare, back in August, the date that I needed the keys by. I have worked in a law firm, twice. I know that this is not how this works. So, I had to go to my solicitor and ask her what to do and despite being on annual leave, she phoned up Gin and told her off. I cannot complete the property purchase without the gas and electrics being tested and if Gin won’t let me get them tested then that is an additional thing that is holding up the completion.

Not only am I not the one who is holding up the property sale, but the seller has not provided my solicitor with the leasehold management pack, which is usually received between week one and six. This week (yes, I know it is the holidays) is week nineteen. I should have received the keys on week eight.

Someone at my workplace said that they think the seller’s bank was holding out for someone to make them a higher offer. Well, the joke is on them, because I could increase me offer up  to £30,000 more, but no one else is interested in a small, one bedroom maisonette.

I was really hoping that I would get the keys on the 20^th December, because where I currently work (a small, local siren company that sells their products all over the world) closes for Christmas, but because the company closes from 20^th December and does not reopen until 2^nd January, I have to use the majority of my annual holiday entitlement over Christmas, which would have been the perfect time to decorate. I only have thirteen days holiday to last me the entire year and I cannot take off more than ten days in a row (which includes the weekends) and I cannot use all of my holiday in one go, it has to be spread out throughout the year, which sucks. I have just gone from the 31^st January until the 21^st December without having any holiday, due to moving jobs several times this year and I am not dead, so surely there is nothing wrong with not having holiday for long periods of time.

The noise problems with my neighbours are getting even worse. Last night there were at least twelve people in their house (possibly more, if guests arrived by taxi) and they were jumping up and down (not on their toes, lightly, but full bangs, house shaking) and shouting and screaming and constant squealing and running around (they usually involve thudding subwoofer speaker pounding music too, but thankfully we were saved from that yesterday). There are no people under the age of twelve in that property, yet you would have thought it was a party for people under the age of five. Their parties go on until 2am and they start again at 6am. The family that live next door are a man who just turned 40, a woman who is a mental health social worked and is 38 and two children, a boy who is 12 and a girl who is 14 and who knocks, bangs and scratches her nails against the wall, places a vibrating device against the wall to vibrate every ten seconds constantly on the wall throughout the night, sets her alarm at multiple times throughout the night to wake up bang on the walls and then go back to sleep, talks on the pone at the top of her voice and squealing until gone midnight and often has whoever her current boyfriend is over and they have incredibly loud hours long intimate time – we can hear it in every single room in our house, so how on earth her mother, father and younger brother allow that to happen is beyond me.

I am desperate for this flat now. I have tried so hard. I have worked so hard. I save my money. I do not drive. I walk wherever possible. I do not go on holiday. I do not go on day trips. I treat every day as though nothing is ever and will ever be special about it and I make sure that it is as boring and mundane as possible and I refuse to let anyone around me make any day different or interesting or special, as an ex used to tell me. Whenever I date someone, I never let us go anywhere or do anything interesting. I will not let us celebrate any day or occasion or make anything nice, special or different from the most boring, dull and depressing, ordinary days, as doing so, I was told time and time again is wrong. We did not put up Christmas decorations this year. We did not have Christmas dinner. I do not celebrate my birthday. I have not received money from any family member – they all beg me for money. I do not have a partner or friend that I am buying this maisonette with. I have no magical deposit fund from somewhere. This is all me. And I have never wanted anything more in my entire life. And that is the update on my process to purchase my maisonette. I really hope that I get the keys soon.

- Josie -