Settlement date buying off the plan

Hi everyone,

I'm new to this forum and property investment but I hope that I can learn something from this forum to help with my first investment property.

My husband and I signed a contract last year to purchase a townhouse off the plan in Canberra. We're based in Sydney. Lately we have sorted out the mortgage and are at the final signing stage. We were told that settlement would happen in November but we still haven't been told the settlement date. The pressing issue now is that we have booked our holidays in early December for a month or so and we were told if we do not settle in time we would have to pay interest. If the settlement happens when we are on holidays is our holiday gonna affect it? How much notice should the developer give us before the settlement?

Any advice will be appreciated!

 

This must be in the actual contract somewhere surely?

 

No need to be present for a settlement usually.

 

No the settlement date in the contract is blank. The contract was signed last year when they didn't even start building the townhouses yet. I guess it was hard to tell when exactly the construction would finish so it was left blank. But a few months ago we were told it would be around November and now it's already mid November and we still haven't been told a settlement date. So I wonder how much notice they should give us....

 

Does it mean that after loan approval we don't have to be in Australia and everything can be sorted out by our conveyancing lawyer?

 

It might be blank, but there should be a provision in the contract saying how and what time frame the vendor will notify you about settlement. Have you had a good look through for that?

 

You will need to manage getting loan documents and mortgages signed somehow, but this could possibly be done overseas. But once that is done there is probably no need to be here.

If you are overseas at this point some lenders would be willing to email loan documents, but you will need to consider the witnessing requirements.

 

Settlement on the Contract is within 14 calendar days from being notified that the Units Plan has settled. But we haven't been notified any date yet...

 

Thanks that's great to hear. We expect to have loan docs signed before our holiday so sounds like we're all good...

 

Then that's your "official" answer. When you do, then you'll know.

They're just giving you some guesstimations as this point (and at every point until your proper settlement clause is triggered).

 

Loan documents will generally only be produced once the plan is registered

 

We've just been told by our lender that the property hasn't been registered so there's no loan document to sign at the moment.

We're now very worried because we don't have much time left before we leave for overseas. Can we "delegate" someone to sign on our behalf if we're overseas? Are there any other ways to do it if it all happens when we're overseas?

 

Power of attorney.

Check that the bank will agree and consider that attorney may see some of your private information

 

Thanks everyone for your input. We got our loan approved a couple weeks ago and now we've been told that we can inspect our property this Thursday. But we still haven't been told when to settle. According to the contract it should be settled 14 days after registration. I just wonder what happens if the settlement date falls on a day when the bank is closed due to the holiday seasons. Can this ever happen?

 

Who approved the loan, who was it setup through, broker/banker?
They should be able to give you estimated time frame for when the bank will be ready to settle.
When registration, your conveyancer should be able to advise.
Banks are closed public holidays, that wont be the settlement date...everyone will be closed.

 

The contract will probably say that if the completion date is a holiday the next business day will be the completion date.

If NSW law applies then you are likely to have 14 more days to settle after you have been issued a notice to complete.

 

Do you know if the apartments are even near completion? I've bought two off the plan in Canberra previously and both were much completed much later than the expected date. The first one was about 6 months late, the second one nearly reached the sunset clause. We thought the builder might be delaying it to take the second one back as it had gone up a fair bit in value