My wife and I are planning to acquire a flat in Pentraeth and are in fact using a Pentraeth conveyancing practice. Within the past 48 hours our property lawyer has sent a preliminary report and documents to look through in anticipation of exchanging contracts shortly. Bank of Scotland have this morning contacted us to inform me that they have now hit a problem as our Pentraeth conveyancer is not on their approved list of lawyers. Please explain?
If you are buying a property needing a mortgage it is conventional for the purchasers' solicitors to also represent 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 as you are at liberty to use your preferred Pentraeth lawyers, in which case it will likely add costs, and it will likely delay the transaction as you have another set of people involved.
It is is a decade since I purchased my property in Pentraeth. Conveyancing lawyers have now been instructed on the sale but I can't find my title documents. Is this a problem?
You need not be too concerned. Firstly there is a possibility that the deeds will be kept by the lender or they could be in the possession of the conveyancers who acted in the purchase. Secondly the likelihood is that the property will be recorded at the land registry and you will be able to prove you are the registered owner by your conveyancing solicitors procuring up to date copy of the land registers. Most conveyancing in Pentraeth involves registered property but in the unlikely event that your property is not registered it adds to the complexity but is resolvable.
What happens if my solicitor is suspended from the Nottingham Conveyancing panel ahead of completing my conveyancing in Pentraeth?
The first thing to point out is that, this is very unlikely to happen. In most cases even where a law firm is removed off of a panel the lender would allow the completion to go ahead as the lender would appreciate the difficulties that they would place you in if you have to instruct a new solicitor days before completion. In a worst case scenario where the lender insists that you instruct a new firm then it is possible for a very good lawyer to expedite the conveyancing albeit that you may pay a significant premium for this. The analogous situation is where a buyer instructs a lawyer, exchanges contracts and the law firm is shut down by a regulator such as the SRA. Again, in this situation you can find lawyers who can troubleshoot their way to bring the conveyancing to a satisfactory conclusion - albeit at a cost.
Are there restrictive covenants that are commonly picked up as part of conveyancing in Pentraeth?
Covenants that are restrictive in nature can be picked up when reviewing land registry title as part of the process of conveyancing in Pentraeth. An 1874 stipulation that was seen was ‘The houses to be erected on the estate are each to be of a uniform elevation in accordance with the drawings to be prepared or approved by the vendor’s surveyor…’
In surfing the world wide web for the words conveyancing in Pentraeth it brings up numerous conveyancersin the vicinity. With so much choice what is the best way to find the right property lawyer for my move?
The best way of seeking the right conveyancer is through a personal recommendation, so ask friends and relatives who have bought a property in Pentraeth or a reputable estate agent or financial adviser. Fees for conveyancing in Pentraeth differ, so it's a good idea to request at least four fee estimates from varying types of conveyancers. Dont forget to clarify what costs in the quote includes.
I bought a flat in Pentraeth last 19/11/2024 and to date it is still not registered with HM Land Registry. It is part of a new estate and my conveyancing practitioner told me that it can take 12 months to complete the registration formalities. I have contacted the Land Registry directly and they say that the original application was cancelled due to failure to reply to requisitions. Do I need to be concerned?
It is your lawyer that you should get in touch with in order to satisfy any concerns which have arisen as part of the registration formalities for your Pentraeth property. Normal Pentraeth conveyancing practice includes an undertaking on the part of the seller's lawyer that they will assist in resolving any registration raised by HMLR so it may be a case of seeking to enforce that undertaking if necessary.