My wife and I are hoping to purchase a home in Hale and have appointed a Hale conveyancing practice. Within the last couple of days our solicitor has sent a preliminary report and documents to look through in anticipation of exchanging contracts shortly. Nottingham Building Society have this evening contacted us to inform me that they have now hit a problem as our Hale lawyer is not on their conveyancing panel. What do we do from here?
If you are buying a property needing a mortgage it is normal 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 Quality Scheme. Your property lawyer should contact your lender and see if they can apply for membership of their conveyancing panel, but if that is not viable they will instruct their own lawyers to represent them. You are not legally obliged to appoint a law firm on the bank's conveyancing panel and you may continue to use your own Hale solicitors, in which case it will likely add costs, and it may delay matters as you are adding another lawyer into the mix.
My solicitor has uncovered a defect with the lease for the property we are buying in Hale. The seller’s lawyers have put forward title insurance as a workaround. We are content with insurance and will cover the costs. Our property lawyer says that he must be satisfied that the bank is willing to move forward with this solution. Are we the client or is the mortgage company ?
The short answer to your last question is that, notwithstanding the risk of a conflict of interest, you and the lender are the client. Your conveyancer must comply with the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook conditions. The UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook conditions require your lawyer to disclose issues such as defects with the lease so that the mortgage company can be afforded the opportunity to check with their valuer as to the extent that the value of the property is affected. Should you refuse to allow your lawyer to make the appropriate notification then your lawyer will have no choice but to discontinue acting for you.
I am looking to buy a property and need a conveyancing solicitor in Hale who is on the Chelsea Building Society approved. Could you point me in the right direction as regards a solicitor?
Our service is limited to being a directory service for firms who wish to listed as being on the approved conveyancing panel for Chelsea Building Society in certain locations such as Hale. We dont recommend any particular firm.
A friend suggested that where I am purchasing in Hale I should ask my conveyancer to carry out a Neighbourhood, Planning and Local Amenity Search. What does it cover?
A search of this type is occasionally included in the estimate for your Hale conveyancing searches. It is a large report of about 40 pages, listing and detailing significant information about Hale around the property and the people living there. It includes an Aerial Photograph, Planning Applications, Land Use, Mobile Phone Masts, Rights of Way, the local Housing Market, Council Tax Banding, the type of People living in the area, the dominant type of Housing, the Average House Prices, Crime statistics, Hale Education with maps and statistics, Local Amenities and other useful data regarding Hale.
I'm buying my first flat in Hale with a mortgage from Chelsea Building Society. The developers would not reduce the amount so I negotiated 6k of fixtures and fittings instead. The sale representative suggested that I not inform my lawyer about this deal as it will adversely affect my loan with the bank. Do I keep my lawyer in the dark?.
All lenders require a Disclosure of Incentives Form from the developer of any new build, converted or renovated property, It is available online from the Lenders’ Handbook page on the CML website. CML form is completed and handed to the lender's surveyor when the inspection is done.
Lenders have different policies on incentives. Some accept none at all, cash or physical, while others will accept cash incentives up to 5%.
Hard to understand why the representative of a builder would be suggesting you withold information from a solicitor when all this will be clearly visible on forms the builder has to supply to its solicitor, the buyer's solicitor and the surveyor.
My wife and I have recently appointed a conveyancing solicitor in Hale. I I would like to check if they are on the lender's approved list of lawyers. Could you or the lender confirm if they are on the panel?
It’s a good idea contact the solicitor to check if they are on the bank's panel. If that does not help call us and we can investigate and revert. Should the firm not be on the bank panel we can certainly arrange a quality conveyancing solicitor in Hale on the panel for your lender.