What They Don’t Want You to Know About Conveyancing

Kindly shared with permission of “Emmersons Solicitors"

The secrets of successful conveyancing they don’t want you to know:

1.     In the client care letter and terms and conditions will be useful information about your obligations and the role of your conveyancer-read the documents you receive and re-read them and ask questions rather than guess.

2.     Read the documents from your lender and work out how much money you are going to need to complete your deal.  Don’t forget about Stamp Duty.

3.     AML is a lot more complicated than you want it to be.  The Solicitor has to be satisfied as to your identity, the source of funds, and how those funds have been accumulated / earned / obtained and the source of wealth (does your story as to the money make sense and appear truthful).  This is a statutory and SRA code of conduct requirement and it’s not for you to determine when AML has been completed, your solicitor must legally make this decision.

4.     A property transaction involves many other people not just you or your timetable.

5.     Estate agents don’t know much about the legal side of the conveyancing process and face no consequences if your property is not legally protected.

6.     After completion the Land Registry will take a long time to register your interest and your Solicitor will have to deal with Lenders Exchange and your lender and others who will send disproportionally aggressive letters/emails and you are not paying for this.

7.     You need to book the Removal Company in good time.

8.     A proposed Completion date isn’t necessarily the same as the confirmed Completion date, many issues have to be dealt with before specific dates can be agreed.

9.     Haranguing the Conveyancer won’t work.

10.  12 weeks from issuing contracts (not when your offer was accepted or AML completed or some other arbitrary date or event) is the normal transaction timescale.

11.  A property transaction is organic, fluid and a negotiation.

12.  Conveyancing works best If you stay cool, practice compassion and remain realistic and polite.

13.  Your Solicitor can end the retainer if you are rude or abusive to their staff.

“They” are all those people who don’t actually undertake conveyancing

If you would like to find out more about my conveyancing services, please get in touch.

Reproduced with authority of Emmersons Solicitors – 18th March 2023