My partner and I are looking to buy a property in Stone Cross and have appointed a Stone Cross conveyancing firm. Within the last couple of days our property lawyer has sent a preliminary report and documents to look through with the expectation that exchange is imminent. Norwich and Peterborough Building Society have this evening contacted us to advise us that they have now hit a problem as our Stone Cross lawyer is not on their approved list of lawyers. What do we do from here?
When purchasing a property with the benefit of a mortgage it is normal for the purchasers' solicitors to also act for the purchaser's lender. 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 Accreditation Scheme. Your solicitor should contact your lender 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 and you may continue to use your own Stone Cross solicitors, in which case it will likely add costs, and it may delay matters as you are adding another lawyer into the mix.
Can you explain why leasehold purchase conveyancing in Stone Cross is more expensive?
Stone Cross leasehold conveyancing transactions usually involve additional investigations than freeholds including investigating the Lease, liaising with the Landlord such as serving applicable notices on the Landlord or managing agent, obtaining up-to-date service charge and management information, obtaining Landlord’s consents and reviewing management accounts and formation documents.
My flat in Stone Cross is up for sale and I have a purchaser. Will my solicitor need to be required to be on the Clydesdale conveyancing panel in order to deal with repayment of my mortgage?
Ordinarily, even if your lawyer is not on the Clydesdale 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 conditions fairly frequently in recent years.
My relative advised me that if I am buying in Stone Cross I should ask my conveyancer to perform 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 Stone Cross conveyancing searches. It is not a small report of more than thirty pages, listing and detailing important information about Stone Cross around the property and the people living there. It incorporates 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 House Prices, Crime statistics, Stone Cross Education with maps and statistics, Local Amenities and other useful data about Stone Cross.
In my capacity as executor for the will of my father I am selling a house in Cardiff but reside in Stone Cross. My lawyer (approximately 260 kilometers from meneeds me to execute a statutory declaration before the transaction finalising. Can you recommend a conveyancing solicitor in Stone Cross to attest and place their company stamp on the document?
strictly speaking you are not likely to need to have the documents attested by a conveyancing solicitor. Normally or notary public or qualified solicitor will be fine regardless of whether they are Stone Cross based