Conveyancing & Property

Whether you are selling your property due to your next big move or change of circumstances or to downsize or due to the death of a family member or whatever the reason may be, you will be in good hands with our Conveyancing team.  

A standard conveyancing transaction for selling a property, would be as follows:

1. Once you have instructed your Conveyancing Specialist, they will send you a client care letter and standard property forms to complete. These forms are the Law Society protocol forms and include the following:
a. Property Information Form
b. Fittings and Contents Form;
c. Leasehold Information Form (if the property is held on a lease)

2. Once you have returned your documents to us, we will obtain office copy entries from the Land Registry and issue the draft contract papers to your Buyer’s legal representative.
3. The Buyer’s legal representative will review the paperwork and raise enquiries if they are required. They may also at this time approve the contract and transfer deed drafted by us or request amendments to the same.
4. If the property leasehold, we will request that the Landlord/Managing Agents provide us with a resell pack. They usually charge a fee for providing the same and we will request the monies from you to pay for the same.
5. If you have a mortgage on the property, we will obtain a settlement figure from the mortgage company. This will be for information purposes only at this stage.
6. Once the contract and transfer deed are approved, we will send the same to you for signing. We will hold the same on the file pending exchange of contracts.
7. Once all enquiries are dealt with and the buyer’s legal representative is happy with all their searches and have their mortgage offer (if applicable), they will send the contract to their client for signing and request deposit funds.
8. Once both parties are ready to exchange contracts, you will agree a date for completion and contracts can be exchanged.
9. Following exchange of contracts, we will then obtain final redemption statement from your mortgage company and the commission account from your Estate Agent. Upon receipt of these we will produce a completion statement and final bill for you.
10. On the day of completion, this is the day that the money is handed over and keys are handed to the Buyers. We will inform you once the money is in our account and that you have completed. You will usually have until 2pm on the day of completion to vacate the property.
11. We will pay off your mortgage, our fees, the estate agent fees and any other fees for the sale of the property and we will send you the net proceeds of sale if you do not have a related purchase.
12. We will send the signed transfer deed to your buyer’s legal representative and your transaction has completed.

Here at Barwells we understand that buying a property is not only very exciting, but it can also be daunting and is one of the biggest financial investments you may make.

That’s why our Conveyancing Team are here to help and provide clear, concise and friendly legal advice and guidance.

Our conveyancing team have many years of experience between them and are all capable of dealing with a purchases of new build properties, leasehold properties, shared ownership properties as well as freehold properties. A purchase can be more complex than a sale and that’s why you need to ensure you appoint someone capable of competently handling your transaction.

A standard conveyancing transaction for purchasing a property, would be as follows:

1. Once you have instructed your Conveyancing Specialist, they will send you a client care letter and a request for documents to deal with our compliance requirements. You will be asked to provide ID and evidence of your funds being used for the purchase.
2. Once you have returned your documents to us, we will review your documents and carry out an search on your identity. Once we have satisfied our compliance requirements, we can review the draft contract papers.
3. The seller’s legal representative will draft the contract and send us paperwork relating to the property. We will review the same and raise enquiries if they are required.
4. We will request your searches, which will include a Local Authority Search, Water and Drainage Search and Environment Search.
5. We will send to you an initial report on the documents received from the seller so far.
6. If you are obtaining a mortgage, once the mortgage offer is sent to us, we will review the same and send you the mortgage deed of signing.
7. Once all enquiries are dealt with and all the searches are returned, we will send the contract to you for signing, along with a final report and a request for deposit funds.
8. Once we are in receipt of signed contract and deposit funds, we are ready to exchange. Both parties will need to agree a date for completion. Once this is done and the seller is a ready or other parties in the chain are ready, contracts can be exchanged.
9. Following exchange of contracts, we will call in your mortgage funds for the day before completion. This is done to ensure that the all things run smoothly on completion. we will also send you a completion statement and final bill. We will request the funds needed from you to complete and again ask that these are sent no later than the day before completion.
10. On the day of completion, this is the day that the money is handed over and keys are handed to you, we will transfer the purchase funds to the seller’s legal representative. Upon receipt of the same they will confirm completion and release keys with the estate agents.
11. We will submit your Stamp Duty Land Tax or Land Transaction Return and pay any tax payable.
12. The Seller’s legal representative will send us the title deeds and signed transfer following completion. Upon receipt of the same we will submit an application to the Land Registry to register the transfer and your ownership as the new owner of the property.
13. Once the Land Registry completes the application, we will send to you a copy of the updated office copy entries.

A shared ownership property is where you will own a share of the property and a registered housing provider owns the other share. The property will be valued and a market valuation given pice paid will be based on share you are buying the market

All law firms must ensure that they are transparent as to their fees, and Barwells Solicitors are no exception. We understand that when you are looking for a Solicitor cost is one of the biggest factors and that’s why we provide a clear quote from the outset.

We will agree a fixed fee with you, but if your matter is more complex or it is difficult to know what will be involved, we may agree an hourly rate with you. Every transaction is unique, so we will keep you informed if we identify any additional work which is needed, to ensure we successfully conclude your matter.

What are our fees?

Fixed fees

Most Solicitors charge a fee based upon the value of the property, so the cost will depend on the sale price of your property, together with a number of other factors, including the complexity of the title and third-party involvement.

Our fees range from £875.00 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £125,000 to £1,845 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £1,000,000.

What are our fees?

Fixed fees
Most Solicitors charge a fee based upon the value of the property, so the cost will depend on the sale price of your property, together with a number of other factors, including the complexity of the title and third-party involvement.

Our fees range from £1125 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £125,000 to £2,095 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £1,000,000.

What are our fees?

Fixed fees
Most Solicitors charge a fee based upon the value of the property, so the cost will depend on the sale price of your property, together with a number of other factors, including the complexity of the title and third-party involvement.

Our fees range from £920.00 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £125,000 to £2,055 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £1,000,000.

What are our fees?

Fixed fees

Most Solicitors charge a fee based upon the value of the property, so the cost will depend on the sale price of your property, together with a number of other factors, including the complexity of the title and third-party involvement.

Our fees range from £1,170.00 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £125,000 to £2,305.00 plus VAT for a freehold property priced at £1,000,000.

What are our fees?

Fixed fees

Most Solicitors charge a fee based upon the value of the funding, so the cost will depend on how much you are borrowing, together with a number of other factors, including the complexity of the title and what your lender requirements are.

Our fees range from £670.00 plus VAT for a freehold property with lending up to £500,000 to £875.00 plus VAT for a freehold property with lending up to £1,000,000.

All professional costs, whether fixed fee or hourly rate, are subject to VAT.
In what circumstances could the costs change?
We want to ensure you only pay for the service you receive, so, as an example, a simple freehold mortgage with standard funding arrangements will cost less than a leasehold mortgage with a lender who requires us to undertake additional work on its behalf:
Some factors which could typically increase the cost of the service you require are:
• if the legal title is defective;
• if the title is unregistered;
• if there is a management company that we need to engage with to ensure compliance with any regulations which may apply;
• if we need to obtain a certificate of compliance for a restriction on the title;
• if the property is subject to a rent charge;
• if we discover that the correct consents have not been obtained for alteration works;
• if you are obtaining financial contributions from third parties;
• if you are purchasing using a complex funding arrangement;
• if you are redeeming a Help to Buy loan;
• if your mortgage company require us to comply with additional requirements before submitting request for funds.

What are disbursements?
Disbursements are charges levied by third parties which apply to your transaction, and which we will pay on your behalf. These costs are fixed by the third-party supplier, and we cannot influence them.
HM Land Registry fees
We will need to obtain official copies of each title document relating to your property, from HM Land Registry. We charge a blanket fee of £15.00 plus VAT which covers the cost of the documents and our time for obtaining the same.
You will also have to pay a fee to the HM Land Registry to deal with the application to register the mortgage on the title deeds. The fee payable will depend on the value of the transaction.
Searches
Your lender may require full searches to be carried out or just a particular search or they may accept search insurance. These costs are not fixed. Each search provider will charge a fee for its service and each local authority, water authority, etc. will have its own fee scale. On average, the searches you will require cost between £250.00 and £400.00 plus VAT.

What are our fees?

Fixed fees

Most Solicitors charge a fee based upon the value of the property, so the cost will depend on how much the property is worth, together with a number of other factors, including the complexity of the title and whether there is any charge secured on the property.

We charge a flat rate for transfer of equity transaction of £820.00 plus VAT

In what circumstances could the costs change?

We want to ensure you only pay for the service you receive. Some factors which could typically increase the cost of the service you require are:

• if the title is unregistered;
• if there is a management company that we need to engage with to ensure compliance with any regulations which may apply;
• if we need to obtain a certificate of compliance for a restriction on the title;
• if you have mortgage company and we need to obtain their consent to the transfer.

What are disbursements?

Disbursements are charges levied by third parties which apply to your transaction, and which we will pay on your behalf. These costs are fixed by the third-party supplier, and we cannot influence them.

HM Land Registry fees

We will need to obtain official copies of each title document relating to your property, from HM Land Registry. We charge a blanket fee of £15.00 plus VAT which covers the cost of the documents and our time for obtaining the same.

You will also have to pay a fee to the HM Land Registry to deal with the application to register the transfer. The fee payable will depend on the value of the transaction.

Stamp Duty Land Tax/ Land Transaction Tax

Every property transaction where money changes hands, will be subject to Stamp Duty Land Tax (if the property is in England) or Land Transaction Tax (if the property is in Wales). The rates are set by the HM Revenue and Customs (for England) and the Welsh Revenue Authority (for Wales). There are various reliefs and additional surcharges, that may be applicable to the transaction.

To ensure that you pay the correct tax, we utilise a third party company called Compass. We will send you a link to your workspace once we are instructed to start the calculation.

Electronic transfer fee

The charge levied by the firm (which includes the cost payable by us to the bank) is £48.00 inclusive of VAT.

What we will do for you

We will let you have a clear quote of our legal fees, which will include us carrying out some or all of the following tasks:

• Acting on your behalf
• Draft the transfer deed and liaise with either the incoming/outgoing party as to having this agreed and signed
• Supply you with a completion statement;
• Completing the transfer
• Registering the transfer with the HM Land Registry

How long will it take?

An average transfer of equity takes between 4 to 6 weeks to complete from us receiving the formal instructions from you. However, this depends on many factors, including the co-operation of all parties.

Possible exclusions

The information above relates to residential conveyancing for individuals who are transferring their own  property. If any of the circumstances below apply, it is likely to involve additional work, or you may require advice from another department within the practice:

• if the property is subject to a mortgage and we need to obtain the mortgage company’s consent;
• if you require a mortgage as part of the transaction.

Overview of the process

Once we have received your formal instructions, we will review the title to your property and draft the required transfer deed.  We will agree the form of the transfer deed with either the incoming or outgoing party (as applicable), obtain all parties signatures to the same once approved and complete the same.  Once the transfer deed is completed we will deal with registration formalities at HM Land Registry to register the transfer.