I am selling my home in Barmouth and the EA has just called to say that the buyers are switching solicitor. The reason given is that the lender will only engage with solicitors on their conveyancing panel. Why would a major mortgage company only deal with certain solicitors rather the firm that they want to choose for their conveyancing in Barmouth ?

Lenders have always had an approved set of law firms that can represent them, but in recent years big names such as Yorkshire Building Society, have considered and reduced their conveyancing panel– in some cases removing conveyancing firms who have worked with them for decades.

Lenders blame a rise in fraud as the reason for the reduction – criteria have been tightened as a smaller panel is easier to keep an eye on. Banks tend not to reveal 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. Plenty of firms 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.

Having sold my house in Barmouth last May but the buyer keeps calling me to say their conveyancer needs to hear from mylawyer. What are the post completion sale legalities following completion?

Following your sale your solicitor is obliged to deliver the transfer deeds and all supplemental paperwork to the purchaser's solicitors. If applicable, your lawyer should also send confirmation that the mortgage has been repaid to the buyers conveyancers. There are no post completion tasks unique to conveyancing in Barmouth.

My friend advised me that where I am buying in Barmouth 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 included in the estimate for your Barmouth conveyancing searches. It is not a small report of more than thirty pages, listing and setting out important information about Barmouth around the property and the people living there. It includes an Aerial Photograph, Planning Applications, Land Use, Mobile Phone Masts, Rights of Way, the Barmouth Housing Market, Council Tax Banding, the demographics of People living in the area, the dominant type of Housing, the Average House Prices, Crime statistics, Barmouth Education with plans and statistics, Local Amenities and other useful information concerning Barmouth.

I'm converting the mortgage on my primary home to a BTL loan with and intend to use the remaining equity as a down payment on a second property. The area we are looking at is Barmouth. Will your conveyancers be able to act for both sets of mortgage companies and tie in the conveyances?

Do use our comparison tool on this site to ensure that the conveyancers are approved by both mortgage companies. Having checked that they are your lawyer should be able to connect the two conveyancing matters but you should talk with you solicitor and specify your desired outcome and requirements.

Estate agents have just been given the go-ahead to market my garden apartment in Barmouth.Conveyancing is yet to be initiated however I have recently received a yearly maintenance charge invoice – should I leave it to the buyer to sort out?

It best that you pay the service charge as you normally would because all ground rent and maintenance invoices should be allottedas part of the financial calculations for completion monies, so you should recover the relevant percentage 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