It is is a decade since I purchased my house in Worcester. Conveyancing solicitors have now been appointed on the sale but I am unable to track down my deeds. Is this a major issue?
Don’t worry too much. Firstly there is a chance that the deeds will be with your lender or they could be in the possession of the conveyancers who handled your purchase. Secondly in most cases the title will be registered at the land registry and you will be able to prove you are the registered owner by your conveyancing solicitors acquiring up to date copy of the land registers. Nearly all conveyancing in Worcester involves registered property but in the rare situation where your property is not registered it is more of a problem but is not insurmountable.
Please help - my lawyer advises that lack of right of way insurance is needed on my purchase. What is the typical level of cover needed for conveyancing in Worcester?
The appropriate level of lack of right of way indemnity insurance should be dictated by who your lender. It would differ for example between Lloyds TSB Bank and Bank of Scotland. Conveyancing lawyers as opposed to members of the public take out such policies.
I have paid off my mortgage with Santander. I assume I don't need a Worcester conveyancing practitioner on the Santander panel to discharge the mortgage at the Land Registry. Please confirm.
If you have finished paying off your Santander mortgage, they may send you evidence showing that you have paid it off. Alternatively they may notify the Land Registry directly. The Land Registry need to see this evidence before they will remove the Santander mortgage from the register. Santander, and any evidence they send you, will determine the action you need to take. In cases where no conveyancer is acting for you and you have paid off your mortgage:
- but are not moving to another property
- where Santander has sent the Land Registry the discharge electronically, and
- Santander has instructed the Land Registry to do so
I recently had an offer agreed on a house in Worcester. My mortgage broker recommended their conveyancers. I paid an advanced payment of £175. A couple of days later, the lawyer called me embarrassingly acknowledging that they were not on the Coventry BS 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 Coventry BS 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.
My friend recommended that if I am buying in Worcester I should ask my conveyancer to carry out a Neighbourhood, Planning and Local Amenity Search. Can you explain what the purpose of this search is?
This is a search is usually quoted for as part of the standard Worcester conveyancing searches. It is not a small document of more than thirty pages, listing and setting out significant information about Worcester around the property and the people living there. It includes an Aerial Photograph, Planning Applications, Land Use, Mobile Phone Masts, Rights of Way, the local Housing Market, Council Tax Banding, the type of People living in the area, the dominant type of Housing, the Average Property Price, Crime details, Local Education with plans and statistics, Local Amenities and other useful information concerning Worcester.
four months have elapsed since my purchase conveyancing in Worcester completed. I have checked the Land Registry site which shows that I paid £175,000 when infact I paid £170,000. Why the discrepancy?
The price paid figure is taken from the application to register the purchase. It is the figure included in the Transfer (the legal deed which transfers the premises from one person to the other) and referred to as the 'consideration' or purchase price. You can report an error in the price paid figure using the LR online form. In most cases errors result from typos so at first glance the figure. Do report it so they can double check and advise.
Am I right to be wary about estate agents that I am dealing with are recommending a factory type conveyancing firm rather than a local Worcester conveyancing company?
As is the case with many service providers, often suggestions from family and friends can be extremely useful or valuable. Yet there are many parties with a vested interest in a conveyancing transaction; estate agents, mortgage brokers and banks might all recommend solicitors to retain. On occasion the lawyers might be known to one of the organisations as being good in their field, but sometimes there exists a financial incentive behind the recommendation. You have the right to select your preferred lawyer. Don't forget that most mortgage providers specify a panel list of lawyers you are obliged to use for the mortgage related work in your conveyancing.
My step-son is embarking on her first house purchase, the home loan was agreed last week in principle. One the offer was accepted on flat we rang the mortgage institution to move forward with his. I was disappointed to hear that mortgage companies do not accept all lawyer, they have to be on a list, is this right?
Banks tend to restrict either the type or the number of conveyancing firms on their approved list of lawyers. Typical examples of such restriction(s) being that a firm must have two or more partners. In addition to restricting the type of firm, some have decided to limit the number of firms they use to represent them. You should note that banks have no responsibility for the quality of advice provided by any Worcester solicitor on their panel. Mortgage fraud was a key driver in the rationalisation of conveyancing panels a few years ago and whilst there are differing views about the extent of solicitor involvement in some of that fraud. Statistics from the Land Registry reveal that thousands of law firms only carry out one or two conveyances a year. Those supporting conveyancing panel cuts ask why law firms should have the right to be on a Lender panel when clearly, conveyancing is not their speciality. To put it another way; would you want a conveyancing solicitor to represent you if you were charged with a crime? Presumably not.