My fiance and I intend to remortgage our flat in County Durham with RBS. We have a son 18 who lives at home. Our solicitor has asked us to disclose any adults other than ourselves who lives in the flat. Our lawyer has now e-mailed a document for our son to sign, giving up any rights in the event that the property is repossessed. I have two questions (1) Is this form unique to the RBS conveyancing panel as he did not need to sign this form when we bought 4 years ago (2) In signing this form is our son in any way compromising his right to inherit the property?
On the face of it your lawyer has done nothing wrong as it is established procedure for any occupier who is aged 17 or over to sign the necessary Consent Form, which is purely to state that any rights he has in the property are postponed and secondary to RBS. This is solely used to protect RBS if the property were re-possessed so that in such circumstances, your son would be legally obliged to leave. It does not impact your son’s right to inherit the apartment. Please note that if your son were to inherit and the mortgage in favour of RBS had not been discharged, he would be liable to take over the loan or pay it off, but other than that, there is nothing stopping him from keeping the property in accordance with your will or the rules of intestacy.
Finally the sale completed on my house in County Durham last March yet the purchaser is Skype messaging daily to moan that his solicitor needs to hear from mine. What should my lawyer have done following completion?
Following your sale your lawyer should send the transfer deeds and all additional paperwork to the buyer’s lawyers. Depending on the transaction, your lawyer must also confirm that the home loan has been redeemed to the purchasers solicitors. There is unlikely to be post completion formalities specific conveyancing in County Durham.
My apartment in County Durham is up for sale and I have accepted an offer. Will the property lawyer need to be required to be on the Aldermore conveyancing panel in order to deal with redeeming my mortgage?
Ordinarily, even if your lawyer is not on the Aldermore conveyancing panel they can still act for you on your sale. It might be that the lender will not release the original deeds (if applicable and increasingly irrelevant) until after the mortgage is paid off. You should speak to your lawyer directly before you start the process though to ensure that there is no problem as lenders are changing their requirements fairly frequently at the moment.
My wife and I have a semi-detached Victorian house in County Durham. Conveyancing practitioner acted for me and Chelsea Building Society. I happened to do a free search for it on the Land Registry database and I saw a couple of entries: one for freehold, another for leasehold under the exact same property. I'd like to know for sure, how can I find out??
You should read the Freehold register you have again and check the Charges Register for mention of a lease. The best way to be sure that you are also the registered owner of the leasehold and freehold title as well is to check (£3). It is not completely unheard of in County Durham and other locations in the country and poses no real issues for owners other than when they mortgage they have to account for both freehold and leasehold interests when dealing with mortgage companies. You can also check the situation with the conveyancing practitioner who carried out the work.
I have been on the look out for a ground for flat up to £195,000 and found one round the corner in County Durham I like with open areas and station in the vicinity, the downside is that it only has 61 years on the lease. I can't really find anything else in County Durham for this price, so just wondered if I would be making a grave error acquiring a short lease?
Should you need a mortgage the remaining unexpired lease term may be problematic. Discount the offer by the anticipated lease extension will cost if not already taken into account. If the existing proprietor has owned the property for at least 2 years you could request that they commence the lease extension formalities and pass it to you. You can add 90 years to the current lease term with a zero ground rent applied. You should speak to your conveyancing lawyer concerning this.
In scouring the world wide web for the words on line conveyancing in County Durham it shows results of numerous property lawyerslocally. How do I determine which is the suitable property lawyer for purchase transaction?
The ideal method of seeking the right conveyancer is through a personal referral, so ask colleagues and those you trust who have bought a property in County Durham or a reputable estate agent or financial adviser. Costs for conveyancing in County Durham vary, so it's advisable to request a minimum of three estimates from different property lawyers. Be sure to obtain confirmation that the fees are fixed.