The Intermediary – November 2025 - Flipbook - Page 48
RESIDENTIAL
Opinion
In by Christmas?
Seasonal pressure,
better outcomes
T
here comes a point
in every year when
advisers – and indeed
everyone involved in
the property buying
and selling process
– will start hearing the same line
from clients: “Can we still get in
by Christmas?”
It’s understandable. People love a
date to aim at, and the idea of a first
Christmas in a new home is powerful.
But property transactions don’t oen
align in such a neat way, and advisers
certainly need to be prepared for this.
Indeed, add bank holidays,
condensed working weeks and yearend processes, and December is oen
the least forgiving time to rely on
luck. That’s precisely why the earliest
advice you give – including your steer
on conveyancing – is crucial.
Of course, this is not just a specific
Christmas issue. It could be February
half-term, Easter, the start of the
Summer, the start of the new school
year, etcetera. These naturallyoccurring deadlines are built into
the calendar, and many people can
have their hearts set on them at any
given time.
What to do?
Let’s focus on Christmas, but this will
be relevant for any time of the year.
Start by planning for two potential and
successful outcomes, not one slightly
brile promise. Plan A is a midDecember completion if everything
lines up. Plan B is a designed earlyJanuary completion that’s calmer,
oen cheaper, and frankly more
achievable for many chains.
The trick is to define both plans
on day one, agree what must happen
this week to keep Plan A alive and
set a wrien ‘go/no-go’ date. If
that slips, pivot to Plan B before
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The Intermediary | November 2025
clients incur rush costs or dri into
disappointment. This single move
reframes the question from “Can we
still get in by Christmas?” to “Actually,
which route gives us the best odds of a
smooth outcome?”
Next comes conveyancing firm
selection. Spike periods amplify the
downside of cheap-sounding options,
so use a distributor like conveybuddy
that can provide the information on
where there is capacity and which of
our panel firms can take your client
smoothly through the process.
Then, be realistic with the client. By
the time you read this in November,
we’ll be past the point of no return for
the vast majority of clients in terms of
geing in by Christmas, but this is just
as relevant at any time.
Be explicit about chain reality
if they’re in a chain. Your client’s
timeline is oen – unfortunately –
going to be set by the slowest party,
not by the date they’ve circled on
the fridge.
Get holiday availability from
everyone involved and resist the
temptation to aim for the last Friday
before Christmas unless the chain is
exchange-ready well in advance.
Mid-month completions are more
resilient because they give room to
manoeuvre.
Transparency in this regard is
also non-negotiable. When people
understand the full picture, they make
beer decisions and they’re far less
likely to chase a date at the expense of
a good outcome.
None of this is about pessimism. It’s
about swapping magical thinking for
professional preparation.
The blunt truth is that too many UK
transactions abort, and too many take
far longer than clients expect. Chasing
an unachievable date certainly doesn’t
help in this regard.
HARPAL SINGH
is CEO at conveybuddy
Leading with clarity,
honesty and transparency
keeps people off the wrong
legal path from the start”
A recent report from TwentyEA/
Ci outlined the reality in stark terms.
Between July and September this year,
82,000 potential sales fell through,
which brought the number this year
alone to 312,700. How many of those
were pushing for a pre-school-year
moving in date?
The data also shows that the average
time to exchange is now 123 days.
That’s four months. To have got in
before the end of September, this
journey would have need to start
back in April or May. To get in before
Christmas this year, we are looking at
August or September.
While I appreciate that advisers
can’t fix every external issue, they
can materially improve the odds by
outlining credible plans, choosing
legal routes that minimise surprises,
and dragging every controllable task
to the front of the process.
Leading with clarity, honesty and
transparency keeps people off the
wrong legal path from the start. Plus,
you get more control when you’re
the one delivering the conveyancing
advice. This always means fewer
disappointments and smoother
completions, whether the keys change
hands in mid-December or the first
week of January.
That’s not just good advice at
Christmas; it’s good advice all year. ●
