I bought a sub sale house on last year, S&P sign on late October 2019. It's almost a year and the transfer process still not complete yet due to multiple factors:
1. House was joint name and one of the owner is deceased
2. Strata title still under developer
3. Delay due to MCO

Long story short, I keep pushing my lawyer to settle this because I waited for almost a year. While I can cancel my purchase and get back my money but the process is troublesome, and I like the house. So my lawyer offer me two choices whether to keep waiting or they can do an early VP agreement while waiting for the transfer process to complete.

Under early VP agreement, seller still own the house legally. My lawyer told me the T&C of Early VP can be negotiated to protect myself such as:
1. No need to pay any rental, only need to pay utility bill.
2. I can change all the locks of the house, and seller have no rights to enter the house.
3. I can do some renovation up to a certain amount of $, if seller suddenly don't want to sell I can get back the money.

Anything else I should be concern of? This early VP is a new concepts to me and I am not sure if any T&C still can be added to protect myself. Anyone had done early VP before maybe can share some advice?

1. house owner joint name
this one troublesome as if other owner not already change name in house grant ,

The deceased one is another owner's wife, but the administrator of the deceased is her sister and husband together

I only know about this after I paid the booking fee, the property agent concealed this information from me

That's why my lawyer say might take up to a years but seems like they need more time, hence the early VP proposition.

Why all the trouble ?

Buy another unit ... what may be a lovely unit can be a nightmare tomorrow.

What if there is a fire in the unit .... who is responsible ?

Will involve lots of trouble and time . If possible want to settle this peacefully

What trouble are you facing ?

Anyway, is up to you but my advise is NEVER take possesion b4 full settlement in the event you want to abort later no matter what the agreement. Your staying there is constraint or limited by the agreement ... you cant renovate or do everything to your liking ... no different from renting !

When the strata title is not perfected, lodging a caveat can be a problem as is still the developer's name.

To cancel the S&P and deal with bank with loan problem, not sure if will affect my insurance or not etc. Not to mention the efforts to find a new house. It's not a trouble but more like hassle to start over again.

You are right about its no difference than renting, that's why I ask my lawyer that if any additional T&C can be added to the agreement to at least let me do minor renovation first.

In many property transaction, when the buyer wants to move in b4 completion of the buying selling process, an agreed rental is charged. I dont think seller will be too generous to grant free stay by just collecting 10% ... who knows, you may be lucky.

This post has been edited by mini orchard: Sep 30 2020, 03:36 PM

If the will of deceased not probated and name of parties not in strata title, it will take more like 2 years not 1 year. The 1/2 share must be assigned to beneficiary by the executors and then strata title transferred to the beneficiary by the Dev. Unless the Developer consents to direct transfer to TS name. If there is an outstanding loan involved it will take even longer.

This post has been edited by cynthusc: Oct 3 2020, 10:20 AM