My fiance and I are planning to acquire a flat in Fairford and have appointed a Fairford conveyancing firm. Within the past 48 hours our lawyer has sent a preliminary report and documents to look through in anticipation of exchanging contracts shortly. Chelsea Building Society have this morning contacted us to inform me that they have now hit a problem as our Fairford conveyancer is not on their conveyancing panel. Is this a problem?
When purchasing a property with mortgage finance it is conventional for the purchasers' lawyers to also act for the purchaser's lender. In order to act for a bank or building society a law firm has to be on that lender's conveyancing panel. An application has to be made by the law firm to the lender to become a member of the lender's panel and there are increasingly strict criteria which the firm has to satisfy and indeed some lenders now require their panel members to be part of the Law Society’s Conveyancing Accreditation Scheme. Your solicitor should contact your bank and see if they can apply for membership of their conveyancing panel, but if that is not viable they will instruct their own solicitors to act. You are not legally obliged to appoint a law firm on the lender’s conveyancing panel and you may continue to use your own Fairford solicitors, in which case it will likely add costs, and it may delay matters as you have another set of people involved.
My fiance and I changing mortgage lender for our flat in Fairford with Clydesdale. We have a son 18 who lives with us. Our solicitor requested us to identify any adults other than ourselves who reside at the property. The solicitor has now sent a form for our son to sign, giving up any rights in the event that the flat is forfeited by the lender. I have a couple of concerns (1) Is this form unique to the Clydesdale conveyancing panel as he did not need to sign this form when we bought 5 years ago (2) Does our son by signing this compromise his entitlement 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 Clydesdale. This is solely used to protect Clydesdale 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 Clydesdale 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.
Do I need to take out insurance to cover chancel repairs when buying a residence in Fairford?
Unless a prior acquisition of the premises completed after 12 October 2013 you could expect solicitors carrying out conveyancing in Fairford to remain encouraging a chancel search and or insurance against a claim.
Just bought a detached house in Fairford , how long should it take for the Land Registry to register my ownership? My Fairford conveyancing solicitor works at snail pace, so I want to check that my purchase is recorded.
There is nothing unique when it comes to conveyancing in Fairford registration formalities. As opposed to being determined by geographic area, timescales can vary depending on the party submitting the application, whether it is in order and whether the Land registry communicate with any interested persons or bodies. At present in the region of 80% of submission are fully addressed in less than three weeks but some can be subject to extensive hold-ups. Registration occurs after the new owner has moved in to the property thus an expedited registration is not typically top priority yet where it is urgent that the the registration takes place urgently then you or your conveyancer must communicate with the Registry to express the reasoning for an expedited registration.
I need to retain a conveyancing solicitor for my conveyancing in Fairford. I have chance upon a site which seems to have the ideal offering If it is possible to get all this stuff done via web that would be preferable. Do I need to be wary? What are the potential pitfalls?
As usual with these online conveyancers you need to read ALL the small print - did you notice the extra charge for dealing with the mortgage?
I work for a busy estate agency in Fairford where we have witnessed a few flat sales jeopardised as a result of short leases. I have been given contradictory information from local Fairford conveyancing solicitors. Could you clarify whether the owner of a flat can initiate the lease extension process for the buyer?
As long as the seller has been the owner for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to start the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. This means that the buyer can avoid having to wait 2 years to extend their lease. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment needs to be completed prior to, or simultaneously with completion of the disposal of the property.
An alternative approach is 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 buyer.
Leasehold Conveyancing in Fairford - Examples of Questions you should ask before buying
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It is important to be aware if a new roof is being put on or some other major work is due shortly that will be shared between the leasehold owners and could well materially increase the the maintenance fees or necessitate a one time payment. The answer will be important as a) areas may result in problems for the building as the common areas may begin to deteriorate if maintenance are not paid for b) if the leaseholders have an issue with the managing agents you will wish to have full disclosure