My partner and I are planning to acquire a house in Montacute and have appointed a Montacute conveyancing practice. Within the past 48 hours our solicitor has sent a preliminary report and documents to look through in anticipation of exchanging contracts shortly. Alliance & Leicester have this evening contacted us to advise us that there is now an issue as our Montacute conveyancer is not on their conveyancing panel. Please explain?
If you are buying a property with the assistance of a mortgage it is usual for the purchasers' lawyers to also act for the mortgage company. 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 solicitor should contact your mortgage company 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 bank's conveyancing panel as you are at liberty to use your preferred Montacute lawyers, in which case your legal fees may increase, and it may delay matters as you have another set of people involved.
Do banks and building societies provide you with an approved list of Montacute conveyancing solicitors? How do you know who is on the Skipton conveyancing panel?
Montacute conveyancing firms themselves provide us confirmation that they are on the Skipton conveyancing panel as opposed to being supplied with a list from Skipton directly.
I note that there are debates on Chancel Insurance on online forums. Do I require this when acquiring a house in Montacute? or I am told that there is an ancient law that means some homeowners residing in a parish church boundary will be compelled to contribute towards repairs towards the chancel in proximity to the church. Is this appropriate for conveyancing in Montacute?
Unless a prior acquisition of the premises took place after 12 October 2013 you could take it that lawyers carrying out conveyancing in Montacute to remain recommending a chancel search and or insurance against a claim.
It has been five months following my purchase conveyancing in Montacute completed. I have checked the Land Registry website which shows that I paid £150,000 when infact I paid £215,000. Why the discrepancy?
The price paid figure is taken from the application to register the purchase. It is the figure included in the Transfer (the legal deed which transfers the residence from one person to the other) and referred to as the 'consideration' or purchase price. You can report an error in the price paid figure using the LR online form. In most cases errors result from typos so at first glance the figure. Do report it so they can double check and advise.
I have been on the look out for a leasehold apartment up to £235,500 and found one near me in Montacute I like with amenity areas and railway links nearby, the downside is that it's only got 61 years on the lease. There is not much else in Montacute in this price bracket, so just wondered if I would be making a grave error purchasing a short lease?
Should you need a mortgage the shortness of the lease may be problematic. Discount the offer by the anticipated lease extension will cost if not already taken into account. If the existing owner has owned the premises for at least twenty four months you can ask them to commence the lease extension formalities and pass it to you. You can add 90 years to the existing lease with a zero ground rent applied. You should speak to your conveyancing solicitor about this matter.
I'm buying a house in Montacute. I can find my conveyancer's company on the Law Society's list, but I can't find my lawyer's name on the list. Should I be concerned?
Not all staff in the law firm must be listed by the regulator. As long there is someone qualified to 'oversee' the conveyancing, the actual day-to-day activity can be conducted by unlicensed staff.