Buying process

The stretch between an accepted offer and a set of keys is where most of the anxiety in buying a home lives, largely because nobody involved is paid to explain it to you. A solicitor answers the questions you knew to ask. An agent answers the ones that move the sale forward. The rest you are somehow expected to already know.

These guides set out the sequence — searches, surveys, enquiries, exchange, completion — in the order it happens, with who is responsible at each stage and what an ordinary delay looks like next to a genuine warning sign. Chains get their own treatment, as does the window before exchange in which either side can still walk away.

The costly habit here is going quiet once the offer is accepted. In England and Wales an accepted offer binds neither side until contracts are exchanged, the price stays open until that moment, and a survey that turns something up is a legitimate reason to reopen it. Understanding what happens next is also what tells you when you still have room to negotiate.