When will exchange of contracts take place for purchase conveyancing in Coney Hall and am I required to attend the conveyancers branch?
Where you are round the corner to one of the conveyancing solicitors in Coney Hall you are welcome to come in to sign the paperwork. That being said, the firms we work with provide a nationwide conveyancing service and give as equally diligent and professional a job for you when dealing with you electronically. The signing of the contract is not when everything is set in stone. A signed contract is just a prerequisite for the firm to exchange contracts at the appropriate time, which will usually be very shortly after signing. The exchange process is nowadays normally dealt with by telephone and can be very rapid, although where an extended "chain" is in play, since the process requires the relevant party's solicitor (not necessarily a conveyancing solicitor in Coney Hall)to be in the office at the appropriate time.
We were going to get a DIP from TSB this week so we know how much we could potentially offer as otherwise we are dependent on web based calculators (which aren't taking into account credit checks etc). Do TSB recommend any Coney Hall solicitors on the TSB conveyancing panel, or is it better to go independently?
You will need to appoint Coney Hall solicitors independently although you'll need to choose one on the TSB conveyancing panel. The solicitor represents both you and TSB through the process.
I recently had an offer agreed on a house in Coney Hall. My mortgage broker pressured me to appoint their property lawyer. I paid an upfront payment of £175. A couple of days later, the property lawyer called me sheepishly admitting that they were not on the Yorkshire BS 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 Yorkshire BS 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.
About to purchase maisonette in Coney Hall. I have received an online quote from a licenced conveyancer, which states: "There will be no charge for dealing with the Building Society if you are obtaining a mortgage". I take this to mean that there will be no additional fee if the solicitor is on the Yorkshire BS conveyancing panel. I wanted to make sure it means there will be no additional fees for dealing with the mortgage.
They are simply saying that the cost for acting for the lender is included in the fee being quoted. It is worth you checking that the Coney Hall conveyancing practitioner is on the Yorkshire BS conveyancing panel.
I have been told that property searches are the number one cause of stalling in Coney Hall house deals. Is this right?
The Council of Property Search Organisations (CoPSO) published conclusions of a review by MoveWithUs that conveyancing searches do not feature amongst the most frequent causes of hindrances during the legal transfer of property. Searches are unlikely to be the root cause of slowing down conveyancing in Coney Hall.
Are there restrictive covenants that are commonly identified during conveyancing in Coney Hall?
Covenants that are restrictive in nature can be picked up when reviewing land registry title as part of the process of conveyancing in Coney Hall. 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…’
I am employed by a reputable estate agency in Coney Hall where we see a number of leasehold sales put at risk due to leases having less than 80 years remaining. I have been given conflicting advice from local Coney Hall conveyancing solicitors. Could you clarify whether the owner of a flat can commence the lease extension process for the purchaser on completion of the sale?
Provided that the seller has been the owner for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to commence the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. The benefit of this is that the proposed purchaser can avoid having to sit tight for 2 years for a lease extension. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment has to be done before, or at the same time as completion of the sale.
Alternatively, it may be possible to extend the lease informally by agreement with the landlord either before or after the sale. If you are informally negotiating there are no rules and so you cannot insist on the landlord agreeing to grant an extension or transferring the benefit of an agreement to the purchaser.
I have tried to negotiate informally with with my landlord to extend my lease without any joy. Can one apply to the Leasehold Valuation Tribunal? Can you recommend a Coney Hall conveyancing firm to assist?
in cases where there is a absentee landlord or where there is disagreement about the premium for a lease extension, under the relevant statutes you can apply to the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) to decide the premium.
An example of a Lease Extension matter before the tribunal for a Coney Hall property is 1 Southlands Court Southlands Road in September 2013. The Leasehold Valuation Tribunal determined that the premium to be paid by the tenant on the grant of a new lease, in accordance with section 56 and Schedule 13 of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 was £30,541 This case affected 1 flat. The unexpired term as at the valuation date was 50.57 years.
We own a leasehold flat in Coney Hall. Conveyancing was finalised in 21012. I have read on a number of consumer forums that I should not let the lease length get too short. Is this correct?
Coney Hall residential long term leases are for a prescribed term - usually 99 years when they started. However many flats in Coney Hall were built or converted 25 or more years ago and so such leases now have less than eighty years unexpired. This may sound like a long time however Banks, Building Societies and other mortgage companies generally need leases to have a minimum of seventy five years left to adequate security. Accordingly when you come to sell the property you will need to extend the term of your lease if you are approaching seventy five years. To increase the saleability of your property you should be considering whether to extend your lease well in advance of selling the property. Furthermore strong financial reasons to doing so before the lease hits 80 years as when the lease is below eighty years the amount you have to pay to extend starts to escalate.