I am progressing with the sale of my ground floor flat in Ranmoor and the EA has just e-mailed to say that the buyers are changing their solicitor. I am told that this is due to the fact that the lender will only deal with property lawyers on their conveyancing panel. Why would a leading lender only engage with certain law firms rather the firm that they want to appoint to handle their conveyancing in Ranmoor ?
Mortgage companies have always had an approved set of law firms they are content to work with, but in the last few years big names such as Nationwide, have considered and reduced their conveyancing panel– in some cases removing conveyancing firms who have worked with them for more than 15 years.
Banks blame a rise in fraud by way of justification for the cull – criteria have been narrowed as a smaller panel is easier to oversee. No lender will say how many solicitors have been dropped, claiming the information is commercially sensitive, but the Law Society claims that it is being contacted daily by practices that have been removed from panels. Some do not even realise they have been dropped until contacted by a borrower who has instructed them as might be the situation in your buyers' case. Your buyers are unlikely to have any impact on this.
In what way does my ID and proof of funds have anything to do with my conveyancing in Ranmoor? What am I being asked for?
Anti-terror and anti-money-laundering laws require solicitors and licensed conveyancers to verify the identity of the potential client they are dealing with prior to agreeing to accepting their conveyancing business. The Terms of Engagement that you need to sign will no doubt reaffirm this. Your lender will also require certain documents to be checked. If you refuse to supply ID verification documents, your solicitor would not be able to act for you.
This question may be naive but I am unseasoned as a 1st time buyer of a ground floor flat in Ranmoor. Do I pick up the keys to the property on completion from my lawyer? If this is the case, I will appoint a local conveyancing solicitor in Ranmoor?
On the day of completion you do not need to attend the conveyancers office in Ranmoor. Your solicitors will transfer the purchase money to the seller's lawyers, and once they have received this, you should be able to receive the keys from the Estate Agents and start moving into the property. This tends to happen between 1 and 3pm.
I recently had an offer agreed on an apartment in Ranmoor. My financial adviser pressured me to appoint their conveyancer. I paid an advanced payment of £150. A few days later, the conveyancing practitioner contacted me to say that they were not on the Kent Reliance conveyancing panel. Am I right in thinking that I should be due a refund?
You should be able to recover this from the law firm if they were not on the Kent Reliance panel. They should have asked at the outset which lender you were obtaining a mortgage with. An important lesson to readers of this site is to check that the lawyers are on the appropriate lender panel.
About to purchase apartment in Ranmoor. I have received an online quote from a licenced conveyancer, which states: "There will be no charge for dealing with the Lender if you are obtaining a mortgage". I take this to mean that there will be no additional fee if the solicitor is on the HSBC conveyancing panel. I wanted to make sure it means there will be no additional fees for dealing with the mortgage.
They are simply saying that the cost for acting for the lender is included in the fee being quoted. It is worth you checking that the Ranmoor lawyer is on the HSBC conveyancing panel.
A friend advised me that if I am buying in Ranmoor I should ask my conveyancer to perform a Neighbourhood, Planning and Local Amenity Search. Can you explain what the purpose of this search is?
A search of this type is sometimes quoted for as part of the standard Ranmoor conveyancing searches. It is a large document of more than thirty pages, listing and setting out important information about Ranmoor around the property and the people living there. It includes an Aerial Photograph, Planning Applications, Land Use, Mobile Phone Masts, Rights of Way, the Ranmoor Housing Market, Council Tax Banding, the type of People living in the area, the dominant type of Housing, the Average Property Price, Crime details, Ranmoor Education with plans and statistics, Local Amenities and other useful data regarding Ranmoor.
Are there restrictive covenants that are commonly identified as part of conveyancing in Ranmoor?
Restrictive covenants can be picked up when reviewing land registry title as part of the legal transfer of property in Ranmoor. 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…’
I am a sole trader looking to lease a unit on a shopping parade. Can you recommend solicitors offering fixed fees for non-domestic conveyancing in Ranmoor for under 1500k?
We are happy to recommend firms who have specialist knowledge of commercial conveyancing in Ranmoor, including the disposal and acquisition of businesses as well as simply property. If you are intending to acquire or sell a shop, pub, restaurant, office, retail premises or a complete business we will find you the right firm. As for the costs this will depend on the structure and complexity of the deal. Please provide us with your contact information or email so as to enable us to furnish you with a detailed commercial conveyancing calculation.