The average home that exchanged contracts in April had gone under offer 104 days earlier, as leasehold transactions continued to slow the buying and selling process.

Connells Group said April was the first April on record in which the national average time between sale agreed and exchange of contracts had stretched beyond 100 days.

The figure is around four weeks longer than in April 2019, when the average was 76 days, and compares with about 60 days in the early 2010s.

The group said 61% of deals now take longer to exchange contracts after a sale is agreed than it takes to find a buyer in the first place.

Nearly one in five homes, at 17%, now take more than six months to exchange after going under offer, up from 13% a year earlier and 5% a decade ago.

Connells said longer waits were leaving buyers and sellers exposed for longer to changes in mortgage pricing, survey outcomes and personal circumstances, increasing the risk that deals fall apart later in the process.

Aneisha Beveridge, research director at Connells Group, said: “For the first time on record, it is now taking more than 100 days, on average, for a sale to progress from offer agreed to exchange. That highlights how much more drawn-out the transaction process has become, particularly since the pandemic.

“Extra checks, longer chains and tighter legal and compliance requirements are all adding time, with leasehold purchases standing out as the biggest contributor to delays.

“The knock-on effect is that buyers and sellers are left exposed for longer once a deal is agreed, and we’re increasingly seeing more transactions collapse later in the process.

“As sales take longer to work their way through the system, buyers become more exposed to changes in mortgage rates and house prices if conditions shift during that period. That extended uncertainty builds further down the line.

“This doesn’t just matter for the housing market itself – delayed or failed moves can also weigh on consumer confidence, labour mobility and, ultimately, wider economic growth.”

LEASEHOLD DELAYS WIDEN

Leasehold properties continue to account for much of the slowdown. In April, the typical leasehold home took 155 days to reach exchange, compared with 97 days for a freehold property.

The 58-day gap between leasehold and freehold transactions is the widest on record, according to Connells, and compares with a 13-day difference before Covid.

The group said more extensive legal requirements and delays by managing agents had slowed the process.

These pressures are most apparent in markets with a higher proportion of flats, including London and other major urban centres, where leasehold homes account for a larger share of transactions.

The difference between cash and mortgaged purchases is also beginning to re-emerge. In April last year, both types of transaction took a similar amount of time to reach exchange, but greater uncertainty in the mortgage market has since widened the gap slightly.

Homes bought with a mortgage and exchanged in April took nine days longer than cash purchases. The gap remains below the 15-day difference recorded in April 2022, when borrowing costs were at their peak and mortgage market volatility was more pronounced.

FALL-THROUGHS HAPPENING LATER

Connells said overall fall-through rates had been broadly stable in recent years, with a decline in freehold fall-throughs offset by an increase in leasehold transactions failing to complete.

In 2025, 37% of agreed sales did not reach completion. Freehold fall-throughs stood at 36%, compared with 43% for leasehold sales.

The gap has widened steadily since 2019, when the two rates were within two percentage points of each other.

Connells said the higher leasehold fall-through rate was generally driven by buyers rather than sellers. Last year, 12% of sellers withdrew from both freehold and leasehold transactions.

By contrast, 25% of freehold buyers pulled out, compared with 34% of leasehold buyers.

Freehold fall-throughs occurred after an average of 85 days, while leasehold deals fell through after 115 days.

Connells said this suggested the extra time required to obtain and review leasehold information could push transactions further along before problems emerge, making collapses more likely later in the process.

In 2025, almost a quarter of fall-throughs, at 23%, happened more than three months after a sale was agreed, up from 18% in 2019.

Late-stage fall-throughs were most common for flats, with 29% taking place after three months, compared with 26% in 2019. For houses, the equivalent figure rose from 17% to 19%.

Connells Group said its research draws on data from across its sales, lettings, mortgage, conveyancing and wider property services businesses.

The group said it sold more than 100,000 homes in 2025, equivalent to one in 10 properties sold across Great Britain, while managing more than 150,000 active tenancies and supporting more than £30 billion of mortgage lending each year.