I plan on purchasing a ground floor flat in Old Coulsdon. My property lawyer is not listed on the mortgage company solicitor list. Is it possible for me to appoint my Old Coulsdon conveyancing solicitor even though they are not on the lender panel?
You have numerous options open to you here
- Complete the deal with your existing Old Coulsdon conveyancing practitioner but your lender will need to retain a solicitor from their approved panel. The net result is additional fees together with likely interruption.
- Get a new conveyancer to act in the purchase, ensuring that they are on the mortgage company conveyancing panel.
- Convince your lawyer to pull out all the stops to get listed on the bank’s conveyancing panel
My fiance and I intend to remortgage our penthouse in Old Coulsdon with Nottingham. We have a son 18 who lives with us. Our solicitor requested us to identify anyone over the age of 17 other than ourselves who reside at the property. The solicitor has now sent a form for our son to sign, waiving any legal rights in the event that the flat is repossessed. I have two questions (1) Is this form unique to the Nottingham conveyancing panel as he did not need to sign this form when we bought 5 years ago (2) Does our son by signing this giving up his rights 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 Nottingham. This is solely used to protect Nottingham 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 Nottingham 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.
Completed the sale of my flat in Old Coulsdon last September but our buyer keeps telephoning every few hours to say his conveyancer is waiting to hear from mine. What should my lawyer have done now that I have sold?
Post completion of your sale your lawyer should send the transfer documentation and all of the paperwork to the buyer’s conveyancer. Depending on the transaction, your lawyer must also evidence that the home loan has been paid off to the purchasers lawyers. There are no post completion tasks unique to conveyancing in Old Coulsdon.
I am thinking of remortgaging my home in Old Coulsdon, does my lawyer have to be on the Clydesdale Solicitor panel?
In theory, you could use a solicitor that is not on the Clydesdale conveyancing panel, but Clydesdale would require one of their panel solicitors to be instructed to act in their interests, and you'd have to pay for this - so most people instruct a panel solicitor. It's also easier, as otherwise you'd have to deal with two solicitors for the same conveyancing matter.
I own a renovated Edwardian house in Old Coulsdon. Conveyancing practitioner represented me and Barclays Direct. I happened to do a free search for it on the Land Registry database and there are a couple of entries: one for freehold, another for leasehold with the matching property. If a house is not a freehold shouldn't I have been informed?
You need to read the Freehold register you have again and check the Charges Register for mention of a lease. The best way to be sure that you are also the registered proprietor of the leasehold and freehold title as well is to check (£3). It is not completely unheard of in Old Coulsdon 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 mortgage companies. You can also question the position with your conveyancing solicitor who carried out the work.
How does the Landlord & Tenant Act 1954 affect my commercial offices in Old Coulsdon and how can your lawyers assist?
The particular law that you refer to gives protection to commercial leaseholders, granting the dueness to make a request to court for a continuation of occupancy when the lease comes to an end. There are limited grounds where a landlord can refrain from granting a lease renewal and the rules are complicated. Fees are different for commercial conveyancing. Old Coulsdon is one of our hundreds of locations in which the firms we work with are located