I am nearing exchange of contracts for my apartment in Sydenham Hill and the estate agent has just telephoned to advise that the buyers are changing their law firm. The reason given is that the bank will only deal with solicitors on their approved list. On what basis would a leading lender only deal with specific solicitors rather the firm that they want to appoint to handle their conveyancing in Sydenham Hill ?
Mortgage companies have always had panels of law firms that can represent them, but in the last few years big names such as Yorkshire Building Society, have considered and reduced their conveyancing panel– in some cases removing conveyancing firms who have represented them for many years.
Lending institutions attribute this action to a rise in fraud by way of justification for the cull – criteria have been narrowed as a smaller panel is easier to maintain. No lender will say how many solicitors have been dropped, claiming the information is commercially sensitive, but the Law Society says 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 purchasers are not going to have any impact on this.
How up to date is your search tool for Sydenham Hill conveyancing solicitors on the Kent Reliance conveyancing panel? Do Kent Reliance send you an updated list?
Sydenham Hill conveyancing firms themselves provide us confirmation that they are on the Kent Reliance conveyancing panel as opposed to being supplied with a list from Kent Reliance directly.
My flat in Sydenham Hill is up for sale and I have accepted an offer. Will the lawyer have to be required to be on the Santander conveyancing panel in order to deal with paying off my mortgage?
Ordinarily, even if your lawyer is not on the Santander conveyancing panel they can still act for you on your sale. It might be that the lender will not release the original deeds (if applicable and increasingly irrelevant) until after the mortgage is paid off. You should speak to your lawyer directly before you start the process though to ensure that there is no problem as lenders are changing their requirements fairly frequently at the moment.
We are purchasing a property in Sydenham Hill. It might be a silly question but how we can trust a lawyer? At some point we will need to deposit money into their account. What is the protection we have from them run away with our money?
Be assured that all money in a Solicitors client account is 100% safe, and even if your Solicitor ran off with it, the Law Society would reimburse you fully.
After much negotiation I have agreed a price on a house in Sydenham Hill. My mortgage broker pressured me to appoint their conveyancer. I paid an on account payment of £175. Soon after, the lawyer contacted me sheepishly admitting that they were not on the Bank of Ireland 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 Bank of Ireland 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.
After shopping around on the internet I have found a Sydenham Hill solicitor having checked that they are on the RBS conveyancing panel. Does my lawyer arrange the survey of the property?
RBS will need an independent valuation of the property. Your lawyer will not arrange this. Usually RBS will appoint their own surveyor to do this, and you will have to pay for it. Remember that this is a valuation for mortgage purposes and not a survey. You may wish to consider appointing your own Sydenham Hill surveyor to carry out a survey or prepare a home buyers report on the property. It is up to you to satisfy yourself that the property is structurally sound before you buy it. If the survey or report reveals that building work is needed, you should tell your solicitor. You may wish to renegotiate with the seller.
Should our conveyancer be asking questions regarding flooding as part of the conveyancing in Sydenham Hill.
Flooding is a growing risk for lawyers carrying out conveyancing in Sydenham Hill. Plenty of people will purchase a property in Sydenham Hill, fully aware that at some time, it may suffer from flooding. However, leaving to one side the physical damage, if a house is at risk of flooding, it may be difficult to obtain a mortgage, suitable insurance cover, or dispose of the premises. Steps can be carried out as part of the conveyancing process to forewarn the buyer.
Solicitors are not qualified to give advice on flood risk, however there are a numerous searches that may be carried out by the buyer or on a buyer’s behalf which can figure out the risks in Sydenham Hill. The conventional set of information supplied to a purchaser’s solicitor (where the Conveyancing Protocol is adopted) incorporates a usual question of the seller to find out if the premises has historically flooded. If the premises has been flooded in past and is not disclosed by the owner, then a purchaser may issue a legal claim for losses resulting from an incorrect answer. The purchaser’s conveyancers should also commission an enviro report. This should higlight if there is a recorded flood risk. If so, further investigations will need to be initiated.
We're new to the buying process - had an offer accepted, but the estate agent told us that the vendor will only go ahead if we use the agent's chosen solicitors as they need a ‘quick sale’. My instinct tells me that we should use a high street solicitor accustomed to conveyancing in Sydenham Hill
We suspect that the seller is not behind this ultimatum. Should the seller desire ‘a quick sale', taking such a hostile approach to a genuine buyer is going to damage their objectives. Speak to the vendors direct and make the point that (a)you are serious buyers (b)you are ready to progress, with finances in place © you are chain free (d) you intend to proceed fast (e)but you will continue to use your preferred Sydenham Hill conveyancing solicitors - not the ones that will provide their estate agent a kickback or meet his conveyancing thresholds pre-set by corporate headquarters.