My wife and I are hoping to acquire a home in Bedworth and have instructed a Bedworth conveyancing firm. Within the last couple of days our property lawyer has forwarded the sale agreement to be signed with a detailed report with a view to exchanging next week. Norwich and Peterborough Building Society have this evening contacted us to advise us that there is now an issue as our Bedworth conveyancer is not on their approved list of lawyers. Is this a problem?

Where you are buying a property needing a mortgage it is usual for the purchasers' lawyers to also act for the mortgage company. 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 mortgage company and see if they can apply for membership of their conveyancing panel, but if that is not viable they will instruct their own solicitors to act. You don't have to instruct a firm on the lender’s conveyancing panel as you are at liberty to use your preferred Bedworth lawyers, in which case it will likely add costs, and it will likely delay the transaction as you are adding another lawyer into the mix.

What does my ID and proof of funds have anything to do with my conveyancing in Bedworth? Is this really necessary?

Anti-terror and anti-money-laundering laws require solicitors and licensed conveyancers to verify the ID of the person or body they are dealing with before they can accept their conveyancing instruction. The Client Care letter that you are required to sign will no doubt reaffirm this. Your lawyer also has obligations to obtain certain documents in accordance with the CML Lenders Handbook requirements last updated on 1st December 2014. Should you refuse to hand over identification documents, your conveyancer would not be able to accept instructions from you.

The Bedworth conveyancing firm that I appointed last week on my house acquisition in Bedworth have without warning shut down. I only went with them because I needed a firm on the Nottingham conveyancing panel and my previous Bedworth lawyer was not. I paid them money in advance. What are my options?

If you have an estate agent involved then inform them straight away so that they advise the vendors that there may be a slight delay due to reasons beyond your control. Most sellers would be sympathetic and urge their lawyer to send a new set of papers to your new solicitors. You should appoint new lawyers that are on the Nottingham conveyancing panel and notify the lender. If you have paid over any money, it will hopefully be held by the SRA as money in an intervened firm's bank accounts is transferred to the SRA. Then, the SRA or the intervention agent looks at the intervened firm's accounts to work out who the money belongs to. To claim your money you will need to contact the SRA. If the SRA cannot return money you are owed from the firm's bank accounts, or if they can only return part of the money, you can apply to the Compensation Fund for a grant. Your new lawyers should be in a position to help.

I am looking into buying my first house which is in Bedworth and I am already nervous. I couldn't find anything specific about Bedworth. Conveyancing will be needed in due course but do you know about the Bedworth area? or perhaps some other tips you can share?

Rather than looking online forget looking online you should go and have a look at Bedworth. In the meantime here are some basic statistics that we found

I’m about to sell my basement apartment in Bedworth. Conveyancing is yet to be initiated, however I have recently received a quarterly service charge demand – Do I pay up?

Your conveyancing lawyer is likely to suggest that you should clear the maintenance contribution as usual as all rents and maintenance invoices will be allotted as part of the financial calculations for completion monies, so you will be reimbursed by the buyer for the period running from after the completion date to the subsequent invoice date. Most managing agents will not acknowledge the buyer unless the service charges have been paid and are up to date, so it is important for both buyer and seller for the seller to show that they are up to date. Having a clear account will assist your cause and will leave you no worse off financially.

I bought a 1st floor flat in Bedworth, conveyancing was carried out 9 years ago. Can you shed any light on how much the price could be for a 90 year extension to my lease? Corresponding properties in Bedworth with an extended lease are worth £195,000. The average or mid-range amount of ground rent is £45 charged once a year. The lease expires on 21st October 2088

With only 64 years left to run the likely cost is going to be between £14,300 and £16,400 plus professional fees.

The figure above a general guide to costs for extending a lease, but we are not able to provide the actual costs without more detailed due diligence. You should not use the figures in a Notice of Claim or as an informal offer. There are no doubt additional issues that need to be considered and clearly you should be as accurate as possible in your negotiations. Neither should you take any other action based on this information before seeking the advice of a professional.