The South Harrow conveyancing firm that just started acting on my house acquisition in South Harrow have without warning shut down. I chose them because I had to have a firm on the Skipton conveyancing panel and my family South Harrow lawyer was not. I paid them £170 on account. What are my options?

Assuming that you have an Estate Agent in the equation then inform them immediately so that they can let the sellers know that there may be a slight delay due to reasons beyond your control. Hopefully they will 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 Skipton 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.

It has been five months since my purchase conveyancing in South Harrow concluded. I have checked the Land Registry site which shows that I paid £200,000 when infact I paid £215,000. 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 property 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.

The estate agent has sent us the confirmation of our purchase of a new build flat in South Harrow. Conveyancing is necessary evil at the best of times but I have never purchased a new build flat before. What sort of enquires would be asked in new build conveyancing.

Here are examples of a few leasehold new build questions that you can expect your new-build leasehold conveyancing in South Harrow

The Landlord must covenant to assume the management if the Management Company goes into liquidation or otherwise defaults in running the management scheme. Please confirm the Lease plans are surveyor prepared. There must be mutual enforceability of lessee’s covenants. The Lease must contain a provision on behalf of the Vendor to pay the service charges in respect of unoccupied units in order to ensure that all services can be provided. Will control of the Management Company (if any) be handed over to purchasers on completion of the last sale or earlier?

I am looking for a ground for flat up to £235,500 and identified one near me in South Harrow I like with amenity areas and station in the vicinity, however it's only got 61 remaining years left on the lease. I can't really find anything else in South Harrow for this price, so just wondered if I would be making a grave error acquiring a short lease?

Should you need a mortgage the remaining unexpired lease term will likely be problematic. Discount the price by the expected lease extension will cost if it has not already been discounted. If the existing owner has owned the premises for at least twenty four months you may ask them to commence the lease extension formalities and then assign it to you. An additional ninety years can be extended on to the existing lease with a zero ground rent applied. You should consult your conveyancing lawyer regarding this.

Should I appoint a South Harrow conveyancing solicitor based in the location that I am buying? An old friend can carry out the legal formalities however his firm is located a couple of hundredmiles drive away.

The benefit of a high street South Harrow conveyancing firm is that you can attend the office to sign documents, hand in your identification documents and apply pressure on them where appropriate. They will also have local intelligence which is a bonus. However it's more important to get someone that will pull out all the stops for you. If you know people who used your friend and the majority were content that must surpass using an unfamiliar South Harrow conveyancing solicitor solely due to them being South Harrow based.