Mortgage approval

Once your offer has been accepted, contact your lender and inform them. Your lender will ask for details of the property such as the address, the type of property and the age of the property. Once a valuation has been completed and the lender is happy with the valuer’s reports, they will approve your loan for the property and the amount, and will send you a formal ‘letter of offer’. This sets out the details of the mortgage your lender is offering you, including:

• The value, length, cost and repayment schedule of the mortgage
• The address and description of the property to be bought
• Any terms and conditions which apply to the offer
• Expiry date of the mortgage offer

Your lender may want to see a surveyor’s report before issuing you a letter of offer if the property is very old. Your bank will also send a copy of your letter of offer to your solicitor, along with other legal paperwork, so you should meet with your solicitor as soon as possible after getting your letter of offer.

Signing contracts

When you meet your solicitor, they will explain and complete various documents with you. If you are happy with all the details, you formally accept the letter of offer from your lender through your solicitor. Your solicitor will also check that the contracts are in order. If they are happy with the contracts, you will sign two copies. Your solicitor will return both of these copies to the seller’s solicitor. At this point you have legally agreed to buy the property.

You will then need to pay a deposit – usually 10-20% of the purchase price depending on whether you’re a first-time buyer or not, less any booking deposit you have paid – to your solicitor, who will arrange to have it paid to the seller through their solicitor.

Once the seller’s solicitor receives the contract you have signed and the deposit, they and the seller will sign and return one copy of the contract to your solicitor. At this point the seller has legally agreed to sell you their property.

Both solicitors will arrange for a final “closing date” and time at which stage you will be given the keys to the property. Before this, the remainder of the money must be paid, which means all the paperwork and approval for your loan must be completed and returned to your lender by your solicitor.

Before your mortgage cheque is issued, you will need to have home insurance in place. Once the property is ‘sale agreed’ you should start looking for insurance so that the house is covered by the time the sale is closed. If you are buying an apartment, buildings insurance should be part of your management fee, so you don’t need to arrange this yourself. However, you may still want to arrange contents insurance before you move in, regardless of whether you are buying a house or an apartment.

Once your lender is happy that they have all the paperwork and it is in order, the mortgage cheque will be issued to your solicitor. Your solicitor will arrange to have these funds transferred to the seller through their solicitor.

Stamp duty

Stamp duty is the tax you will have to pay when you buy a property. Since December 2010, the rate is 1% of the purchase price for properties valued up to €1 million, and 2% on any amount over that. Your solicitor will arrange to pay the stamp duty for you, but bear in mind you will need to pay this money to your solicitor when they are closing the sale – so you will need to have this amount of money available.

Collect your keys and move in

Once the balance of the funds have been transferred to the seller before the agreed closing date and time, the estate agent will call you and explain that everything is in order for the closing. The estate agent will also remind the seller of the closing date and time. If you are also selling a property you should try and exchange contracts and close on the same day as your purchase so you can move straight to your new home if possible. Once the estate agent tells you that the keys are ready to be collected, the property is officially yours, so the seller must have left the property, and removed any items not included in the sale, before this time. It is also now your responsibility to make sure that the property is safe and secure, so even if you are not moving in immediately you should still visit the property. You should also make sure you have insurance in place.