I am obtaining a offer of a home loan from Santander. My intention is to retain the legal services of a Licensed Conveyancer in Sherborne. Does the Santander Solicitor panel exclude Licensed Conveyancers?
The Santander conveyancing panel is, like many other lenders, associated to the CML or BSA, open to Licensed Conveyancers regulated by the Council of Licensed Conveyancers.
We were just about to exchange contracts for a semi detached house in Sherborne. We have hit a problem. The loan offer with Barnsley Building Society expires on 5/8/2025 but the owners are putting forward a completion date of 7/8/2025. Can one extend the loan offer?
The best person to address this question is your lawyer who will calculate whether they better off negotiating with the mortgage broker, vendor’s solicitors, property agents or conceivably all three taking into account the circumstances your house move to date.
We are buying a 4 bedroom semi-detached house in Sherborne. The intention is to an extension at the rear at the property.Will legal investigations on the property involve checks to see if these alterations are permitted?
Your solicitor should review the registered title as conveyancing in Sherborne can occasionally identify restrictions in the title deeds which prevent categories of alterations or necessitated the permission of a 3rd party. Certain extensions require local authority planning consent and approval in compliance with building regulations. Some locations are designated conservation areas and special planning restrictions apply which often prevent or affect extensions. You should check these things with a surveyor before you commit yourself to a purchase.
When it comes to lenders such as Lloyds, do Sherborne lawyers incur a fee to be on the conveyancing panel?
We are unaware of any lender fees to be on their panel, although some do charge an administration charge to deal with the processing of the conveyancing panel submission.
I recently had an offer agreed on an apartment in Sherborne. My mortgage broker recommended their conveyancers. I paid an on account payment of £225. Shortly after, the lawyer called me sheepishly admitting that they were not on the Nationwide 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 Nationwide 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.
Over the last few months I have been searching for a flat up to £195,000 and identified one round the corner in Sherborne I like with open areas and transport links nearby, the downside is that it's only got 49 remaining years left on the lease. I can't really find anything else in Sherborne for this price, so just wondered if I would be making a mistake acquiring a lease with such few years left?
Should you require a home loan that many years may be an issue. Discount the offer by the expected lease extension will cost if not already taken into account. If the current owner has owned the premises for a minimum of 2 years you could request that they commence the lease extension formalities and pass it to you. An additional ninety years can be extended on to the existing lease term with a zero ground rent applied. You should speak to your conveyancing solicitor regarding this matter.
As co-executor for the estate of my father I am disposing of a house in Newport but I am based in Sherborne. My solicitor (approximately 250 kilometers awayrequires that I sign a statutory declaration ahead of the transaction finalising. Could you suggest a conveyancing practitioner in Sherborne to witness and place their company stamp on the document?
Technically speaking you should not be required to have the documents witnessed by a conveyancing solicitor. Normally or notary public or solicitor will do regardless of whether they are Sherborne based
I am a negotiator for a busy estate agency in Sherborne where we see a few leasehold sales derailed due to leases having less than 80 years remaining. I have been given inconsistent advice from local Sherborne conveyancing solicitors. Please can you shed some light as to whether the owner of a flat can initiate the lease extension formalities for the purchaser on completion of the sale?
As long as the seller has been the owner for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to kick-start the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. This means that the buyer can avoid having to sit tight for 2 years to extend their lease. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment needs to be completed prior to, or at the same time as 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.
Sherborne Conveyancing for Leasehold Flats - A selection of Questions you should consider before buying
-
Is the freehold owned collectively by the leaseholders? Plenty Sherborne leasehold properties will have a service charge for maintenance of the block set on behalf of the freeholder. Where you buy the flat you will have to meet this liability, normally in instalments accross the year. This may be anything from a few hundred pounds to thousands of pounds for large purpose-built buildings. There will also be a ground rent to be met annual, this is usually not a exorbitant sum, say about £50-£100 but you should to enquire as occasionally it could be surprisingly expensive.