The owners of the house we are looking to purchase have appointed a conveyancing practitioner in Penzance who has suggested a preliminary contract with a payment of 5k. Is it wise to enter into such agreements?
There are a couple of primary drawbacks with executing a lock out agreement (sometimes termed a no-shop agreement) is that it can distract from making progress with the conveyancing work, so in the absence of it needing minimal or no negotiation then it could transpire to be a cause of frustration and delay. It is not promoted by Penzance conveyancing practitioners for this reason. The other main concern is the extent of the remedies available - a jilted buyer should not expect to be issued with an injunction to stop the vendor selling to a third party, so the only remedy open via the agreement will be the recovery of abortive costs and, in limited scenarios, the extra payment of damages.
It is is a decade since I acquired my house in Penzance. Conveyancing lawyers have recently been appointed on the sale but I can't track down my title deeds. Will this cause complications?
You need not be too concerned. First there is a possibility that the deeds will be with the mortgage company or they may still be with the solicitor who acted in the purchase. Secondly in most cases the property will be registered at the land registry and you will be able to establish that you own the property by your conveyancing solicitors procuring current official copies of the land registers. Almost all conveyancing in Penzance relates to registered property but in the unlikely event that your home is unregistered it is more of a problem but is resolvable.
The Penzance conveyancing solicitors that just started acting on my purchase in Penzance have suddenly shut down. I only went with them because I had to have a lawyer on the Bank of Ireland conveyancing panel and my family Penzance lawyer was not. I wrote them a cheque for £250 in advance. What do I do now?
If you have an estate agent involved then let them know straight away so that they can let the sellers know that there may be a slight delay due to the problems encountered. 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 Bank of Ireland 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 solicitors may be able to help.
We have agreed to purchase a house in Penzance. One unusual aspect is that the roof has a solar panel. Skipton have issued a mortgage offer so presumably this is not a concern to them. Why is my solicitor raising questions about the panel?
Given that you are obtaining a mortgage with Skipton your lawyer must follow the formal instructions set out in Part 2 of UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook for Skipton. The Council of Mortgage Lenders’ Handbook sets out minimum requirements for solar panel roof-space leases, and conveyancing practitioners are required to report to Skipton where a lease fails to meet these specifications. The conditions relate to the installation of panels on properties nationwide and is not isolated to Penzance.
I have today made my last payment due on my mortgage with TSB. I assume I don't need a Penzance conveyancer on the TSB panel to discharge the mortgage at the Land Registry. Am I right?
If you have finished paying off your TSB mortgage, they may send you evidence showing that you have paid it off. Alternatively they may notify the Land Registry directly. The Land Registry need to see this evidence before they will remove the TSB mortgage from the register. TSB, and any evidence they send you, will determine the action you need to take. In cases where no conveyancer is acting for you and you have paid off your mortgage:
- but are not moving to another property
- where TSB has sent the Land Registry the discharge electronically, and
- TSB has instructed the Land Registry to do so
Planning on purchasing a maisonette in Penzance. 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 Lloyds 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 Penzance lawyer is on the Lloyds conveyancing panel.
I am downsizing from our property in Penzance and the buyers lawyers are claiming that there is a possibility that the property was built land that was not decontaminated. A local conveyancer would know that there is no such problem. It does beg the question why the buyers instructed a factory type conveyancing practice rather than a conveyancing solicitor in Penzance. We have lived in Penzance for many years we know of no issue. Do we get in touch with our local Authority to seek confirmation need.
It would appear that you have a conveyancing firm currently acting for you. What do they say? You need to enquire of your lawyer before you do anything. It is very possible that once the local authority has been informed of a potential issue it cannot be insured against (a bit like being diagnosed with a serious illness and then taking out health insurance to cover that same ailment)
I have been on the look out for a ground for flat up to £305k and identified one close by in Penzance I like with a park and railway links nearby, the downside is that it only has 49 years unexpired on the lease. There is not much else in Penzance for this price, so just wondered if I would be making a grave error buying a short lease?
Should you require a home loan the remaining unexpired lease term will likely be problematic. Reduce the price by the amount the lease extension will cost if not already taken into account. If the current owner has owned the property for a minimum of twenty four months you could ask them to start the process of the extension and then assign it to you. You can add 90 years to the existing lease with a zero ground rent applied. You should consult your conveyancing lawyer regarding this matter.