Okay, quick question for those of you with more knowledge and experience on this area, if I may.
My partner and I have recently had an offer for a property accepted and are working towards exchanging contracts in the coming days. It should be a very straight forward transaction due to us being first time buyers (no downward chain) and the current vendor herself purchasing a new build (no upward chain). It's the new build part that has sought to complicate matters right from the off though, by imposing unrealistic deadlines, coupled with threats of selling the property from under the nose of the vendor (despite her placing a deposit on the house). It's all been very awkward and downright snide at times from their part, and from speaking with other people who have dealt with new homes companies, it (somewhat scarily) seems common practice. I wasn't surprised to discover that it was Redrow Homes in our case, owned of course, by a certain Steve Morgan who we're all familiar with.
Anyway, that's just a bit of basic background. I've now been informed that our deadline (imposed by Redrow) to exchange contracts has been extended, from 31/03 (which was never, ever realistic) to this week (awfully kind of them), and as such we're working frantically to get that done. The thing that has me a little uncomfortable though, is the request that we hand over our deposit at this point as well. The new build is not set to be completed until late August, and therefore our completion date is currently set for mid-September, so what this means is that we're handing over a significant amount of money to another company, for them to take advantage of for five months. I understand that in a standard purchase the exchange would not be far in advance of the completion date and therefore this kind of process would make more logical sense, but in our specific scenario I find it rather odd, frankly.
Anyone been in a similar situation? Or just know what the standard practise is in this kind of scenario?