I am expecting a mortgage with Lloyds. I intend to retain the legal services of a Licensed Conveyancer in Fleet. Does the Lloyds Solicitor panel exclude Licensed Conveyancers?
The Lloyds approved solicitor list is, like many other lenders, represented by the Council or Mortgage Lenders or Building Society Association, open to Licensed Conveyancers regulated by the CLC.
I am acquiring a house for cash in Fleet. I have lived for the last 20 years in Fleet. Conveyancing searches are expensive. As I know the road and vicinity intimately should I not bother getting the solicitor to do all the conveyancing searches?
Provided that you do not need a home loan, then all but one or two of the Fleet conveyancing searches are non-obligatory. Your lawyer will 'advise', perhaps strongly, that you should have searches completed, but she has a professional duty to do this. One thing to take into account; if you are intend to dispose of the house in the future, it could be of interest to your future purchaser what the searches disclose. There are plenty of instances where houses with functional issues can still throw up unfavourable search results. A good conveyancing solicitor in Fleet should be able to give you some sensible advice in this regard.
My lawyer in Fleet is not listed on the Barnsley Building Society Solicitor Panel. Is it possible for me to retain my prefered solicitor notwithstanding that they are excluded from the Barnsley Building Society approved list?
Your options are as follows:
- Complete the purchase with your existing Fleet solicitors but Barnsley Building Society will need to use a lawyer on their list of acceptable firms. This will result in additional total conveyancing charges as well as cause frustration.
- Find an alternative practitioner to to deal with the conveyancing, obviously checking they are Barnsley Building Society approved.
- Try to convince your Barnsley Building Society based solicitor to attempt to join the Barnsley Building Society panel
is it true that all Fleet solicitors on the Lloyds conveyancing panel are overseen by the Solicitors Regulatory Authority?
As solicitors, in order to be on the Lloyds conveyancing panel they would need to be governed by the SRA. Many mortgage companies do permit licenced conveyancers on their panel in which case such organisation would be overseen by the Council of Licensed Conveyancers.
We are getting the release of further funds on our mortgage from Principality as we want to carry out renovations to our house in Fleet. Are we obliged to select a nearby Fleet solicitor on the Principality conveyancing panel to handle the paperwork?
Principality do not ordinarily appoint firms on their approved list of lawyers to deal with such a matter. If they do require any legal work then you would need to ensure that such a lawyer was on the Principality conveyancing panel.
We expect to receive a AIP from Clydesdale this week so we can work out what to offer on a property we like as otherwise we only have online calculators to go by (which aren't taking into account credit checks etc). Do Clydesdale recommend any Fleet solicitors on the Clydesdale conveyancing panel, or is it better to go independently?
You will need to appoint Fleet solicitors independently although you'll need to choose one on the Clydesdale conveyancing panel. The solicitor represents both you and Clydesdale through the process.
I am close to exchanging contracts on the sale of our property in Fleet and according to the buyers it appears that there is a possibility that the property was constructed land that was not decontaminated. Any high street Fleet lawyer would know that there is no such problem. For the life of me I don't know why the buyers used a national conveyancing outfit rather than a conveyancing solicitor in Fleet. Having lived in Fleet for three years we know of no issue. Should we get in touch with our local Authority to get clarification need.
It sounds as though you may have a conveyancing firm currently acting for you. Are they able to advise? You need to enquire of your lawyer before you do anything. It is very possible that once the local authority has been informed of a potential issue it cannot be insured against (a bit like being diagnosed with a serious illness and then taking out health insurance to cover that same illness)
I was pointed in your direction by three or four local selling agents in Fleet to find a conveyancer using your seach tool. What’s the financial advantage for Estate Agents to recommend your services over and above alternative conveyancing organisations?
We refuse to make any referral fee for pointing buyers and sellers our way. We found it would be just too difficult to pay a commission as home movers will think, ‘How come the agent getting a kickback? Why aren’t I receiving any benefit too?’ So we decided to step away from that.