Up there, back there, ahfuck

Searching for rooms is kind of annoying. It's very similar to job searching in that there's a lot of waiting for responses and turn downs and so on. Had a viewing of a room today that would be quite nice as it is with a youngish group but, like with the jobs, you don't want to get your hopes up about getting it and the wait is always a bit nervy as you look for other places just in case.

In the process of my first move, pretty daunting to be honest. 
My dad is selling the family home and moving to Spain for semi retirement to be near his brothers. My younger brother is moving in with his gf and I was looking to move out to a small place on my own. 
However my old man has a plan, he wants to spend 4-6 months at a time living abroad and then come home for a month to pick up some work and see family before heading back out there again, repeating the cycle. 
So he is buying a modern 2 bed flat in Hertfordshire and asking me to rent it off him. 
He gets a base to come back to, I get a very nice 2 bed flat for a fraction of the cost. Win! 

We spent the last week just hunting for flats, seems like we finally found the perfect place! After weeks of hunting and finding nothing but pokey little flats in expensive developments we came across one that is in a brilliant little location, near to the mainline train station putting me just 45 mins from central London and a 15 minute cycle across country to work. Walking distance to the town centre, ample parking and almost twice the square footage of everywhere else that we looked at for £20k less! 
I'm quite excited, hope it all works out.

Does anyone want to hear my bitching about Taylor Wimpey & HSBC? No? I'll press on regardless.

Buying my first house w/girlfriend (not engaged or married), nice 3 bed semi detached just outside Newcastle. Only problem was that it wasn't built yet, and was scheduled for completion May 2012. This was August 2011. Around Jan/Feb of this year, TW ring and state that the build was delayed for 2/3 months due to an issue with another house type. No prior warning, just "this is what will happen". Bellends. Moaned about the handling of the situation to TW for long enough that they took 2k off the price (it was that or free standard carpets). Problem solved...

... until they start pressing us to get a mortgage in place. Went with HSBC, as they had the best rates at the time (obviously). However, they insisted that you could only use one of about 5 solicitors. We had already proceeded with the family solicitor up to this point, and wasn't going to do them over because HSBC said so. Ended up using both, which was a fucking nightmare. Had TW ringing me, threatening that I'd lose the house if I didn't get it sorted even though the issue was between solicitors and not me. I kicked off again at this point, and that seemed to smooth things over. Had to take time off work as a result of the pressure, I'm not great with money-related stress.

HSBC have since gone back on their decision to force you to use their solicitor but that doesn't get me back the extra £300-400 we had to shell out. And the stress. HOWEVER, since we got the keys, there haven't been any major issues (yet). I'm eyeing up one of our ceilings though, as it looks a bit suspect. Expecting to come home one day to my bed being on top of the TV.

tl:dr; never buy a house that you can't see. 

Mod74 wrote:

Can they legally force you to choose their solicitor? I think a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman might be in order.

They disguised it as something else, like the solicitor had to be on their approved panel (which shrunk from 1000s to about 10). We wrote to HSBC afterwards and they were all like "HAHA WE DON'T CARE" so I think yeah, we might need to go to the FO and see what he/she/it says about the matter. The fact they removed this piece of legislation makes me think that they know they were in the wrong...

Good luck, Sparky. We're moving at the start of January.

Moving sucks balls, so good luck to you guys. Pro-tip: Make sure the kettle and tea making supplies are to hand to keep you going. Don't want to be digging around for those!

IT BEGINS.

Right, i'll see you on Wednesday when I hopefully have Internet again. Best of luck to all who are moving too, it's a right clart on.

That's amazing.

Yes, everything is now Christmasified.

Who needs pshop?

That's an easy one though, the antlers were already there for a kick off...

Someone change the thread title. And tell Mod and his mate that the photo was taken in the middle of summer.

Aye. Bring your speedos next time you're up.