Simultaneous Settlement: Sell and Buy on the Same Day
How a same-day settlement works in Australia, the order funds move, what the clause commits you to, and what happens when one side is not ready.
Property Lending Hub
Simultaneous Settlement · Same Day · Linked Workspaces
A simultaneous settlement lets the sale of your old home fund the purchase of your new one on the same day. Here is the order funds actually move, what the clause in your contract commits you to, and what your options are on the day if the other side is not ready.
Quick Answer
A simultaneous settlement is one property deal completing at the same moment as another, so the sale of your old home pays for the new one that day. It removes the funding gap and replaces it with a dependency: two files, both ready at once, run by people you do not control.
Part of the bridging finance guide, alongside guide to buying before selling.
Also called: same-day settlement, contemporaneous settlement. All three describe the same arrangement, one sale and one purchase completing on a single day with the proceeds of the first funding the second.
What is a simultaneous settlement, and how does it work in Australia?
A simultaneous settlement is a sale and a purchase that complete on the same day, with the proceeds of the sale used to fund the purchase. The property exchange that most Australian conveyancers now settle through defines it plainly: a simultaneous settlement through that platform refers to workspaces that are settling at the same time, on the same day (PEXA content hub, Simultaneous settlements made simple with PEXA, published March 2018, read 14 September 2026).
That means both transactions are booked into one electronic workspace slot. Documents are signed digitally, the money is routed by the exchange rather than handed over as bank cheques, and the two files are joined so that neither can proceed alone. Nobody drives anywhere. If your file is ready and everyone else's file is ready, the whole thing takes minutes.
People choose it for three reasons: they avoid owning two properties at once, they avoid the cost of funding a gap between the two dates, and they move once instead of twice. The usual result is that the buyer treats the same-day arrangement as the cautious option. It is actually the tighter one, because it removes the buffer that a gap would have given you.
The date itself is a contract term, not a legal default. The Victorian consumer regulator puts it directly: "You set the date of settlement in the contract of sale" and "The settlement period is usually 30 to 90 days and can be negotiated with the buyer" (Consumer Affairs Victoria, Property settlement, selling a property, last updated 8 April 2026, read 14 September 2026). That guidance is Victorian and each state publishes its own, but the principle holds nationally: there is no statutory period anywhere in Australia, so the length of your run-up is something you negotiate rather than something you are given. More on how this fits the wider lane sits on the property lending hub.
In what order do the funds actually move on the day?
The money moves in one direction on the day: in from your buyer, out to discharge the loan over the home you are selling, and only then out again to complete your purchase. Each step depends on the one before it, which is why the order matters far more than the total.
The exchange has its own name for that dependency. A linked settlement, in the platform's words, occurs when destination funds from one settlement are used as source funds in another (PEXA content hub, published March 2018). Your sale's destination funds are your purchase's source funds. That single sentence is the whole mechanism, and it is also the whole risk.
- Your buyer funds the sale. Their lender releases the price for your old home into the sale workspace.
- Your existing mortgage is discharged. Your current lender is paid out of those proceeds, and the rates, water and land tax adjustments are settled at the same time.
- What is left becomes your contribution. The net figure, not the sale price, is what carries across to the purchase.
- Your new lender's advance is released. It lands in the purchase workspace alongside your contribution.
- The purchase completes. The balance is paid to your seller, duty is dealt with, and the transfer and your new mortgage are lodged for registration.
The figure that catches people out is not the purchase price. It is the difference between the net proceeds at step three and the balance due at step five, once the payout figure, the agent's commission and the adjustments have all come off. Ask your conveyancer for that number in writing before you rely on it, because it typically moves in the final fortnight and it is the number your whole day rests on.
| What has to be ready | Who is responsible for it | What happens if it is not ready on the day |
|---|---|---|
| Funds from the buyer of your old home | That buyer, their lender and their conveyancer | Nothing enters the sale workspace, so the linked pair cannot start |
| Discharge authority over your existing mortgage | Your current lender, requested through your conveyancer | The sale cannot complete, so no proceeds reach the purchase |
| Your new loan unconditionally approved and ready to release | Your incoming lender, once every condition is cleared | You are short on the purchase even if the sale completed cleanly |
| Transfer and mortgage documents signed and identity verified | You, your conveyancer and the verification step they run | The workspace cannot be signed off in its slot |
| Settlement figures and adjustments agreed on both files | Both conveyancers, working to the two contracts | The workspace will not balance and the booking lapses |
| Both workspaces linked and every participant accepted | Your conveyancer, with every other participant | The two settlements do not fire together, which defeats the purpose |
| Cleared funds for any shortfall you have to contribute | You | The purchase workspace is short and cannot proceed |
What is a simultaneous settlement clause, and what does it commit you to?
A simultaneous settlement clause is a term written into one of your contracts that makes that contract's completion conditional on the other one completing at the same time. It is a contractual link rather than a banking arrangement, and it is the thing that decides whether a same-day plan holds together or quietly becomes your problem alone.
Clauses of this kind typically do some combination of three things. They tie the two completion dates together. They may give one or both parties a right to extend, or to end the contract, if the linked transaction fails. And they may allocate who carries the cost of a delay, which is the part people read last and regret first. The wording is not standard. It varies between firms, between states and between a residential contract and a commercial one, and the same heading can sit above materially different obligations.
This is also where the page stops and your own adviser starts. We do not draft contract terms and we do not interpret them, and no general article can tell you what the words in front of you commit you to. Take the clause to your conveyancer or solicitor and ask three specific questions: what triggers it, what it entitles you to do if the other side fails, and what it costs you if you are the one who cannot complete. What a broker can usefully do is make sure the finance is ready for whatever answer you get back.
One practical point worth raising with them at the same time. If the clause allows the parties to agree a later date rather than terminate, that is a deferred settlement, and it is a very different outcome from a failed one. Knowing in advance whether your contract permits it changes what you do on the morning things slip.
What happens when one side of the link is not ready?
When one side of the link is not ready, neither side completes. This page covers what happens to the day itself; the contractual consequence of the slip, who breaches, whose deposit is exposed and whether an extension is available, is set out in the companion piece on two contracts written for one settlement date. That is the entire point of linking them, and it is also the exposure: a delay that is nobody's fault on your file still lands on your file.
It is worth saying plainly that this is the part nobody publishes. The exchange operator sets out a clear definition of the structure and does not publish what happens when one workspace in a link is not ready. The Victorian regulator's guidance covers the seller's process and the duty payable, not delay remedies. From the underwriter's seat, that absence is why the question keeps being asked, and it is also why this section carries no timeframe: there is no published service standard behind it worth quoting, and a number invented to fill the gap would be worse than none.
What actually happens is that the workspace does not settle in its slot, both conveyancers reschedule for the next available time, and the contracts take over from the platform. Your purchase contract may begin charging penalty interest against you from the due date, and your seller may be entitled to issue a formal demand. Penalty interest on late settlement covers the first of those and the notice to complete covers the second, including the deadlines that apply in each state.
On the day itself there are only three useful questions. Which side has stalled, and is it hours or days. Can the purchase still proceed on its own if the funding gap is covered from somewhere else. And will the other party agree to a short extension rather than enforce. If the answer to the second one matters to you, the fast settlement finance guide sets out what can realistically be arranged at that notice and what cannot.
| Where it breaks down | What actually happens | What it costs you as the buyer |
|---|---|---|
| The buyer of your old home cannot fund | Your sale fails, so the source funds for your purchase never exist | You are in default on your purchase with no failure of your own to point to, and your remedies sit against your buyer rather than against your seller |
| Your own new loan is approved but not ready to release | The purchase workspace is short even though the sale completed | Penalty interest under your purchase contract, charged from the due date until you complete |
| A document is signed incorrectly or verification is incomplete | The workspace cannot be signed off and the slot is lost | A rebooking to the next available time, plus the cost of a household that has already moved out |
| The discharge over your existing mortgage is not authorised in time | Your sale cannot settle, which stops the linked purchase with it | The same default exposure as a failed sale, with the delay attributable to your side of the file |
| Figures or adjustments are still in dispute at the cut-off | The workspace will not balance and does not proceed | Usually recoverable within a day or two, but only if both conveyancers are still reachable |
| The delay runs on past the contract's tolerance | Your seller issues a formal notice requiring you to complete by a stated date | The deposit and the contract itself come into play, which is a question for your solicitor immediately |
Why do two conveyancers on two contracts make this harder?
Two conveyancers on two contracts make this harder because no single person is responsible for the day. Your conveyancer acts for you on both of your files, but the other parties have their own advisers, their own lenders and their own instructions, and none of them owes your timetable anything.
Count the participants once and the difficulty stops being surprising. There is you, your conveyancer, the lender being paid out, the lender advancing your new loan, the buyer of your old home with their own lender and conveyancer, your seller with theirs, a valuer somewhere in the middle, and the land registry at the end. An answer that one of them needs has to travel through two or three others to reach the person who can give it. A question left unanswered on a Friday afternoon is a Monday problem, and a Monday problem inside a two-day window is the whole window.
What actually reduces the risk
Four things, and none of them are expensive. Name one point of contact on each file and use them rather than copying everybody. Have both completion dates and the booked time written the same way in both contracts, because two dates described differently is the single most common cause of a mismatch. Clear every condition on your own finance well before the week of the move rather than in it. And sign your documents and complete your identity verification early, since it is the one item entirely within your control.
Lenders look at whether a file is complete before they look at whether it is urgent, and the same is true of a conveyancer trying to book a slot. If you want to compare the structural alternatives to a same-day arrangement before you commit to one, the guide comparing a bridging loan, a caveat loan and a second mortgage sets them side by side, and the insight on a caveat loan against a tight completion date shows what the fastest of those looks like on a live file.
When is a short bridge cheaper than a same-day completion that fails?
A short bridging loan is cheaper than a same-day arrangement that fails whenever the cost of the funding is one you choose in advance and the cost of the failure is one you do not. A bridging loan is quoted, dated and finite. A failed completion lands on top of a contract you have already signed, and it can carry penalty interest, a formal notice you have to answer, and a household with nowhere to sleep, none of which you can cap in advance.
You can weigh this without knowing a rate. The price of short-term property-secured funding turns on how long you need it, what the security is, where the total debt sits against the value of the property, and how strong and how soon the repayment is. All of those are indicative and vary by lender, and any figure quoted to you before a lender has seen the security is a guess. What is not a guess is the shape: the shorter the term and the clearer the repayment, the less the structure costs you.
That repayment is the whole assessment. On a short-term loan the exit strategy is assessed at the same moment as the security, not afterwards. Where the exit is a sale that has already fallen over once, expect that to be the first thing asked about and expect to need evidence rather than an intention.
Whether a particular funder will look at a file like yours depends on the purpose, the security and the evidence behind that repayment, so it is a conversation rather than something you can read off a page. Switchboard arranges short-term property-secured funding for self-employed borrowers and business owners through non-bank and private lenders, including caveat-backed facilities where the purpose is business related and the property is one you already own. If your date is at risk, the fastest way to find out where you stand is to check eligibility and speak to a broker before the week of completion, not during it.
If the purchase you are trying to settle was bought at auction, the position tightens again, because there is no finance clause to fall back on. That case is covered in the piece on bidding at auction before your home has sold.
A simultaneous settlement is not a product and it is not a shortcut. It is a scheduling decision that trades a funding gap for a dependency, and it is worth making deliberately rather than by default. The money moves in one order and only one order, so the number that matters is the net proceeds after the payout and the adjustments, not the sale price. The clause that ties the two contracts together is a legal question for your conveyancer, and it is the document that decides what happens if the day goes wrong. Nobody publishes what a stalled link costs, because the cost is written into your contracts rather than into the exchange, which is why the answer is always to read them before you need to.
Key takeaway: the same-day arrangement removes your buffer, so the work is front-loaded, get your own side finished early and know in advance whether your contract lets the date move.Frequently Asked Questions
A simultaneous settlement works by scheduling your sale and your purchase into the same electronic time slot, so the sale proceeds fund the purchase the same day. Your existing mortgage over the home you are selling is discharged out of the sale first, and what remains is combined with your new loan to complete the purchase. Because the two are linked, neither completes unless both can. Where the two cannot be lined up, the guide to buying before selling as a self-employed borrower covers the alternatives.
A simultaneous settlement is risky in one specific way: it removes your funding gap and replaces it with a dependency on people you do not control. The mechanics themselves are routine and most complete without incident, so the risk is not the structure, it is that the structure has no slack in it if one participant is late. If your own contract leaves you very little room to move, the fast settlement finance guide covers what the options look like when the date is tight.
Things can go wrong on settlement day, and the usual causes are a participant who is not funded, a document signed incorrectly, a discharge that was not authorised in time, or figures still in dispute at the cut-off. Any one of them stops the workspace, and a linked pair stops together. Where a delay then flows into penalty interest under your contract, penalty interest on late settlement sets out how that is calculated and who wears it.
Linking a simultaneous settlement inside the exchange is your conveyancer's job rather than yours: they join the two workspaces so the funds released by one are recognised as the source funds for the other, and every participant in both must accept before the slot proceeds. What you can control is your own side of it, your documents, your identity verification and your loan conditions, all finished early. If the two cannot be joined in time, a negotiated deferred settlement is one of the alternatives your conveyancer may raise with the other party.
If the buyer of your old home is not ready on the day, your sale does not complete, and because your purchase draws on those proceeds your purchase does not complete either. You are in default on a contract through no act of your own. The immediate questions are whether an extension is available and whether the purchase can be funded another way for a short period. A short-term loan over property you already own is one route, and the insight on two contracts written for one date covers who carries the cost.
FBAA Accredited
