This question may be naive but I am new to the process as a 1st time buyer of a two bedroom flat in Bishops Waltham. Do I receive the keys to the property on the completion date from my solicitor? If this is the case, I will use a local conveyancing solicitor in Bishops Waltham?
On the day of completion you will not be required to go to the conveyancers office in Bishops Waltham. Conveyancing lawyers for you will transfer the purchase money to the vendor’s solicitors, and once they have received this, you will be able to pick up the keys from the property Agents and move into your new home. This tends to happen between 1 and 3pm.
I have paid off my mortgage with Bank of Ireland. I assume I don't need a Bishops Waltham lawyer on the Bank of Ireland panel to remove the mortgage at the Land Registry. Am I right?
If you have finished paying off your Bank of Ireland mortgage, they may send you evidence showing that you have paid it off. Alternatively they may notify the Land Registry directly. The Land Registry need to see this evidence before they will remove the Bank of Ireland mortgage from the register. Bank of Ireland, and any evidence they send you, will determine the action you need to take. In cases where no conveyancer is acting for you and you have paid off your mortgage:
- but are not moving to another property
- where Bank of Ireland has sent the Land Registry the discharge electronically, and
- Bank of Ireland has instructed the Land Registry to do so
I recently had an offer agreed on an apartment in Bishops Waltham. My mortgage broker recommended their conveyancers. I paid an on account payment of £175. Soon after, the lawyer called me sheepishly admitting that they were not on the Leeds Building Society conveyancing panel. Am I right in thinking that I should be due a refund?
You should be able to recover this from the law firm if they were not on the Leeds Building Society panel. They should have asked at the outset which lender you were obtaining a mortgage with. An important lesson to readers of this site is to check that the lawyers are on the appropriate lender panel.
A colleague suggested that where I am purchasing in Bishops Waltham I should ask my conveyancer to perform a Neighbourhood, Planning and Local Amenity Search. What does it cover?
This is a search is usually quoted for as part of the standard Bishops Waltham conveyancing searches. It is a large document of about 40 pages, listing and setting out important information about Bishops Waltham around the property and the people living there. It includes an Aerial Photograph, Planning Applications, Land Use, Mobile Phone Masts, Rights of Way, the Bishops Waltham Housing Market, Council Tax Banding, the type of People living in the area, the dominant type of Housing, the Average House Prices, Crime statistics, Bishops Waltham Education with maps and statistics, Local Amenities and other useful data regarding Bishops Waltham.
Are there restrictive covenants that are commonly picked up as part of conveyancing in Bishops Waltham?
Covenants that are restrictive in nature can be picked up when reviewing land registry title as part of the process of conveyancing in Bishops Waltham. An 1874 stipulation that was seen was ‘The houses to be erected on the estate are each to be of a uniform elevation in accordance with the drawings to be prepared or approved by the vendor’s surveyor…’
Over the last few months I have been searching for a ground for flat up to £195,000 and identified one close by in Bishops Waltham I like with amenity areas and transport links nearby, the downside is that it's only got 61 years on the lease. There is not much else in Bishops Waltham suitable, so just wondered if I would be making a mistake buying a short lease?
If you need a home loan that many years will likely be problematic. Discount the price by the amount the lease extension will cost if not already taken into account. If the current proprietor has owned the premises for a minimum of 2 years you could ask them to commence the lease extension formalities and then assign it to you. An additional ninety years can be extended on to the current lease term and have £0 ground rent by law. You should speak to your conveyancing lawyer concerning this matter.
I am attracted to a couple of apartments in Bishops Waltham both have in the region of forty five years left on the leases. should I be concerned?
There is no doubt about it. A leasehold apartment in Bishops Waltham is a deteriorating asset as a result of the shortening lease. The closer the lease gets to its expiry date, the more it adversely affects the marketability of the property. The majority of purchasers and banks, leases with under 75 years become less and less marketable. On a more upbeat note, leaseholders can extend their leases by serving a Section 42 Notice. One stipulation is that they must have owned the property for two years (unlike a Section 13 notice for purchasing the freehold, when leaseholders can participate from day one of ownership). When successful, they will have the right to an extension of 90 years to the current term and ground rent is effectively reduced to zero. Before moving forward with a purchase of a property with a short lease term remaining you should talk to a solicitor specialising in lease extensions and leasehold enfranchisement. We are are happy to put you in touch with Bishops Waltham conveyancing experts who will explain the options available to you during an initial telephone conversation free of charge. A more straightforward and quicker method of extending would be to contact your landlord directly and sound him out on the prospect of extending the lease. You may find he or she is happy to negotiate informally and willing to consider your offer straight off, without having to involve anyone else. This will save you time and money and it could help you reach a lower price on the lease. You need to ensure that the agreed terms represent good long-term value compared with the standard benefits of the Section 42 Notice and that onerous clauses are not inserted into any redrafting of the lease.
Bishops Waltham Leasehold Conveyancing - A selection of Queries before Purchasing
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How many of the leaseholders are in arrears for their maintenance charge payments? You should be aware if it is less than 80 years it will affect the salability of the flat. Check with your mortgage company that they are willing to go ahead with the loan given the lease term. Leases with fewer than 80 years remaining means that you will most likely need a lease extension at some point and it is worth finding out how much this would cost. Remember, in most cases you would be be obliged to have owned the premises for two years in order to be eligible to extend the lease. The best form of lease arrangement is a share of the freehold. In this situation the leaseholders benefit from control and although a managing agent is usually retained if the building is larger than a house conversion, the managing agent employed by the leaseholders.
Is there a reason that Bishops Waltham conveyancing fees are higher for leasehold and freehold properties?
If purchasing a leasehold property there is more work involved purely due to the fact that usually there are further parties involved in the form of the freeholder and/or Management Agents. As part of a lawyers enquiries they will check that all ground rent and service charges are paid up to date amongst other general leasehold matters. For this reason, the Sellers lawyers usually have to refer to the freeholder or Managing Agent for their replies to our questions. This may be time consuming and beyond the lawyers control