As I am unsure how the conveyancing bit works what is the most important advice you can impart about purchase conveyancing in Knebworth?
You may not hear this from too many lawyers but conveyancing in Knebworth or throughout England and Wales is an adversarial process. Put another way, when it comes to conveyancing there exists an abundance of room for confrontation between you and others involved in the transaction. E.g., the vendor, property agent and on occasion the lender. Selecting a solicitor for your conveyancing in Knebworth is a critical decision as your conveyancer is your adviser, and is the ONE person in the process whose interest is to look after your legal interests and to protect you.
There is a worrying increase in the "blame" culture- someone must be at fault for the process being so protracted. We recommend that you your first instinct should be to trust your solicitor ahead of all other parties in the conveyancing process.
My wife and I have a 4 bedroom Georgian property in Knebworth. Conveyancing solicitor represented me and Accord Mortgages Ltd. I did a free Land Registry search last week and I saw two entries: the first freehold, another for leasehold with the matching property. If a house is not a freehold shouldn't I have been informed?
You should assess the Freehold register you have again and check the Charges Register as there may be 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 Knebworth 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 lenders. You can also enquire as to the situation with the conveyancing practitioner who conducted the purchase.
I am buying my first flat in Knebworth with a loan from Santander. The sellers would not budge the price so I negotiated £7000 of extras instead. The property agent told me not inform my lawyer about the extras as it will jeopardize my mortgage with Santander. Should I keep quiet?.
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.
I opted to have a survey done on a property in Knebworth in advance of retaining lawyers. I have been told that there is a flying freehold element to the house. Our surveyor has said that some lenders tend not give a loan on this type of house.
It varies from the lender to lender. Bank of Scotland has different instructions from Halifax. If you e-mail us we can check via the relevant lender. If you lender is happy to lend one our lawyers can assist as they are accustomed to dealing with flying freeholds in Knebworth. Conveyancing can be more complicated and therefore you should check with your conveyancing solicitor in Knebworth to see if the conveyancing will be more expensive.
How easy is it to use your search facility to choose a conveyancing lawyer in Knebworth on the panel for my bank?
First pick a mortgage company such as Yorkshire Building Society, Barnsley Building Society or Britannia then type in your location for example Knebworth. Conveyancing firms in Knebworth and nationally should be listed.
I work for a busy estate agency in Knebworth where we see a few flat sales jeopardised due to short leases. I have been given conflicting advice from local Knebworth conveyancing solicitors. Could you shed some light as to whether the seller of a flat can initiate the lease extension formalities for the purchaser on completion of the sale?
Provided that the seller has owned the lease 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 wait 2 years for a lease extension. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment has to be done before, or simultaneously with completion of the disposal of the property.
Alternatively, it may be possible to agree the lease extension with the freeholder 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.
Knebworth Leasehold Conveyancing - Examples of Questions you should ask before buying
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How much is the maintenance charge and ground rent on the property? Most Knebworth leasehold flats will incur a service charge for maintenance of the block levied by the management company. Should you purchase the flat you will have to meet this charge, normally periodically throughout the year. This could differ from a few hundred pounds to thousands of pounds for large purpose-built blocks. In all likelihood there will be a ground rent to be met yearly, this is usually not a significant sum, say around £25-£75 but you need to check it because on occasion it could be prohibitively expensive. The best form of lease arrangement is where the freehold title is owned by the leaseholders. In this arrangement the tenants benefit from being in charge if their destiny and although a managing agent is frequently retained where it is larger than a house conversion, the managing agent is directed by the tenants.