Helping You Understand Your Conveyancing...

A simple definition of conveyancing is "the transfer of ownership or property rights from one individual to another". Hackett Windle have several years conveyancing experience and our job is to ensure that there are no problems relating to the property you are buying or selling. We also give you the peace of mind that all legal formalities have been carried out properly.

Once we have received our instructions to act for you (this normally comes from Simplicity Financial Services), you can expect to hear from us within 7 working days. We will write to both you and Simplicity Financial Services to acknowledge our instructions and send you our Terms of Business letter and ‘Guide to Buying and Selling’. At this stage, a team will be allocated to deal with your case and you will be given a direct dial telephone number to contact them. Any member of the team will be able to help you with your enquiries throughout the transaction.

We will also write to the estate agent and the Seller’s Solicitors as soon as we know who they are, requesting contract documentation.

We’re just as keen as you are to complete your transaction quickly, so we apply for searches on your property as soon as we receive our instructions to act for you. At this stage we carry out a combined local and environmental search, which searches the Council’s register as to any restrictions within the boundaries of your new property. Please see our ‘Guide to Buying and Selling’ for full details of our local search facility.

The Seller’s Solicitors have to provide us with legal details of the property. The main document is the contract. This is prepared by the Sellers’ Solicitors and sets out the terms of what has been agreed (i.e. price, names of people involved). There are also other documents which the Sellers Solicitors need to send us regarding planning permission, rights of way and other important matters. Quite often we will need to raise additional questions about these prior to exchange.

We will normally receive our copy of your mortgage a day or so after you, and we will then write again to the other side to request contracts if they have not already sent these to us. Provided we have received:

• the results of our searches,
• our copy of the mortgage offer and
• contract papers from the other side solicitors

your file will be passed to our title examiner who will check the title, raise any further enquiries and apply for any specialist searches required (for example, a mining search or water search) and prepare our report to you. We aim to send this report to you within 7 working days.

Once you receive our report PLEASE READ ALL DOCUMENTS CAREFULLY before you sign them. In some circumstances you will need to have your signature witnessed. Occasionally this will need to be witnessed by another solicitor, but normally documents can be witnessed by someone over the age of 18 who is NOT a member of your family and who does not have an interest in the transaction. We will clearly indicate to you who needs to sign and where.

Within our report you will also find a deed of consent form, (sometimes called an occupiers waiver), which needs to be signed by anyone who will be living in your property who is over the age of 17 and not named on the mortgage. Sometimes they will have to take independent legal advice before signing this form. If this is not applicable in your case simply return the form to us.

You should send all documents and your identification back to us by Special Delivery. Your identification will be checked and returned to you by Special Delivery. Details of the types of identification we can accept are highlighted in our ‘Guide to Buying and Selling’. However, we have a special arrangement with Simplicity whereby they can certify your original identity documents and send us a certified copy, many clients find this preferable to parting with precious documents such as their passport.

Once we have received:

• your signed documentation
• results of all searches (including specialist searches)
• answers to any additional questions we have raised with the other side solicitors

we will talk to you about the completion date. At this stage we also have to ensure that all the mortgage lenders conditions have been met and that you have adequate Buildings Insurance and Life insurance in line with the lenders specific requirements, Simplicity can liaise with us to provide details of your Buildings and Life insurance. Different lenders have different conditions and all of these need to be met before funds will be released. Lenders conditions can range from seeing a structural survey report to seeing divorce papers.

You should arrange to send us your deposit as soon as you have returned your documentation. You should send this by telegraphic transfer and details of how to pay this are included in our ‘Important Notes’ folder that we send to you with our report. Telegraphic Transfer is far safer than sending a cheque or bankers draft which can get lost.

If you and your Sellers have agreed a date for completion we will try and meet this date. It is not however always possible, particularly if the date is too soon or some important document or information is missing. As we say in our ‘Guide to Buying and Selling’ please DO NOT book time off work or book a removals company until we know a definite date. You should make sure you have at least 7-10 days between exchange and completion.

Once we are entirely satisfied that all queries have been answered and all conditions have been met, we can move onto exchanging contracts. By this time you should have returned the contract and we ‘exchange’ this with the other side. Once contracts are exchanged, both sides are legally committed to go ahead. We will not allow you to exchange until we have ensured that the title to the land is guaranteed and that there can be no dispute as to the ownership. Exchange is legally binding and neither party can back out without suffering loss.

On the day of completion you do not need to come to our office. We will arrange to send the purchase money to the sellers solicitors, and once they have received this, you will be able to pick up the keys from the Estate Agents and move into your new home. This does not normally happen until early or mid afternoon. Please note that Fridays are particularly busy and you may not be able to pick up the keys until late in the afternoon.

There are a variety of factors affecting the timescale of these transactions. For example, how quickly the other side solicitors respond to enquiries, results of searches, and how quickly the other parties involved can arrange their finances.

Obviously if there is a chain with many sellers and buyers totally dependant on each other, delays can occur. On average though, it is likely to take between 9-12 weeks, and at Hackett Windle we try our best to meet deadlines, providing that it does not compromise your long term interests or the quality of our work!

No two transactions are the same so it is impossible to be specific about how long the process will take. Often unnecessary delays can occur if signed documents, building insurance information and existing lender information is not returned to us at the earliest opportunity.

Once completion has been confirmed, we will forward any outstanding monies due to you by cheque. We can transfer money straight into your account but there will be an extra charge of £60. After completion has taken place our Post Completion department deals with the payment of your Stamp Duty (where applicable) and the registration of the title. This process can take several months to finalise (long after the move!!).

If there is a mortgage on the property then the Mortgage Deeds are sent to your mortgage lender where they are held until the mortgage has been paid or the property is sold. If there is no mortgage involved you will need to tell us whether you require the Deeds to be sent to you. If you wish, Hackett Windle can provide safe and secure storage of your Deeds at no extra charge.

If you are buying a leasehold property, you will see an amount called ‘leasehold expenses’ on your completion statement. This amount is intended to prevent delays in completion and cover any unexpected charges by the landlord, such as service charges or ground rent. Any unused part of this money will be paid back to you within three months after completion. We also reserve the right to charge extra fees in leasehold cases if the case becomes more complicated than anticipated. In order to ensure that the property has a good and marketable title there are additional enquiries we must make in these cases and you should be aware that the purchase of a leasehold property does usually take longer to deal with than the purchase of a freehold property.

It is the responsibility of the Seller’s Solicitor to provide sufficient information in order for us to deal with our questions, but they may be dependent on others such as a Landlord or Management Company to supply information to them before passing it on to us! The longer it takes the Seller’s Solicitor to supply this information to us, the longer the transaction will take!

If you are selling, we need to prepare a Seller’s Pack. To do this we need the name, address and account number of your existing lender or, if you do not have a mortgage, details of where the Title Deeds are being kept. We then request the Deeds to your property and prepare the contract to send to the Buyers Solicitors. At this stage, we will report to you and send some forms which need to be completed and returned to us.

Once we receive the Deeds and signed documents, we can then issue a contract and respond to any questions that the buyer’s solicitor may raise. We will then send you your part of the contract for signature .When a completion date has been agreed we write to your existing lender and request a redemption statement; this tells us how much is required to pay off your existing mortgage. A transfer of your property is prepared by the Buyer’s Solicitor and this will also be sent to you for signature.

As soon as the Buyers’ Solicitors are ready, exchange can take place and we will agree a completion date. If you are selling AND buying, then we will need to exchange on both transactions at the same time so that you are not left without a home or with two!

Your mortgage with your existing lender must be paid right up to the agreed completion date and your lender will provide us with the figure required to redeem your mortgage up to the time of completion. PLEASE DO NOT CANCEL YOUR MORTGAGE PAYMENTS UNTIL WE HAVE CONFIRMED THIS TO YOU. Details of when to start paying your new mortgage are included in your mortgage offer but if you are unsure, please contact your new lender directly to arrange your payments.

Moving house is stressful, and some people react better to stress than others. Whatever the concerns, we will deal with them sympathetically.
Please note however that it is not always possible to speak to the Senior Team Leader, but any messages left with us will be dealt with, they are not ignored!! Don’t forget though, ANY member of the team will be able to help you with your enquiries.

Remember also that we are on your side and sometimes we do need time to follow something through.

Delays do happen in buying property, through no fault of ours and whilst we will try and accommodate your wishes for completion dates, it is not always possible but we’ll do as much as we can.