My fiance and I are looking to purchase a property in Chatteris and have instructed a Chatteris conveyancing firm. Within the last couple of days our conveyancer has forwarded the sale agreement to be signed with a detailed report with a view to exchanging next week. Britannia have this afternoon contacted us to advise us that there is now an issue as our Chatteris solicitor is not on their approved list of lawyers. Please explain?
When purchasing a property with the benefit of a mortgage it is conventional for the purchasers' solicitors 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 Accreditation 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 lawyers to represent them. You are not legally obliged to appoint a law firm on the lender’s conveyancing panel as you are at liberty to use your preferred Chatteris lawyers, in which case your legal fees may increase, and it may delay matters as you have another set of people involved.
Are the Chatteris conveyancing solicitors identified as being on the Skipton conveyancing panel, together with their details provided by Skipton?
Chatteris conveyancing firms themselves provide us confirmation that they are on the Skipton conveyancing panel as opposed to being supplied with a list from Skipton directly.
Is it the case that all Chatteris CQS (Conveyancing Quality Scheme) solicitors are on the Leeds Building Society conveyancing list of approved practices?
A selection of banks and building societies now use the accreditation scheme as the starting point for Panel approval such as HSBC and Santander. CQS membership however gives no guarantee to lender panel acceptance. Nevertheless,the Council of Mortgage Lenders have indicated that it is likely to become a pre-requisite for solicitors wishing to remain on their approved list of firms.
When it comes to mortgage companies such as Principality, do Chatteris solicitors incur an annual charge to be on the list of approved solicitors?
We are not aware of any bank fees to be on their list of approved firms, although some do levy an administration fee to deal with the processing of the conveyancing panel submission.
About to purchase house in Chatteris. I have received an online quote from a licenced conveyancer, which states: "There will be no charge for dealing with the Building Society if you are obtaining a mortgage". I take this to mean that there will be no additional fee if the solicitor is on the Barclays conveyancing panel. I wanted to make sure it means there will be no additional fees for dealing with the mortgage.
They are simply saying that the cost for acting for the lender is included in the fee being quoted. It is worth you checking that the Chatteris lawyer is on the Barclays conveyancing panel.
Despite weeks of looking the Title Certificate and documents to my home are lost. The conveyancers who dealt with the conveyancing in Chatteris 4 years ago have long since closed. What do I do?
As long as you have a registered title the information relating to your proprietorship will be evidenced by HMLR under a Title Number. It is possible to carry out a search at the Land Registry, find your house and order up to date copies of the property title for less than a fiver. Where the title is Leasehold then the Land Registry will usually retain a file duplicate of the Registered Lease and again, a copy can be retrieved for a small fee.
Due to the encouragement of my in-laws I had a survey completed on a house in Chatteris ahead of appointing solicitors. I have been informed that there is a flying freehold element to the property. The surveyor advised that some lenders will not give a mortgage on such a premises.
It depends who your proposed lender is. Bank of Scotland has different instructions from Halifax. Should you wish to call us we can investigate further with the relevant lender. If you lender is happy to lend one our lawyers can assist as they are accustomed to dealing with flying freeholds in Chatteris. Conveyancing can be more complicated and therefore you should check with your conveyancing solicitor in Chatteris to see if the conveyancing will be more expensive.
I need to instruct a conveyancing solicitor for sale conveyancing in Chatteris. I've discover a site which appears to be the ideal solution If it is possible to get all formalities done via web that would be preferable. Do I need to be wary? What are the potential pitfalls?
As usual with these online conveyancers you need to read ALL the small print - did you notice the extra charge for dealing with the mortgage?