If you’re selling your home, you may already have a conveyancing solicitor on your side. If not, now is the time to do it! The conveyancing process can be a complex part of selling your home.
It involves legally transferring the property to the buyer. This starts the moment you accept the offer. So, what should you know before you accept an offer? Here’s a quick guide to help.
Table of Contents
The Conveyancing Solicitor
It’s important to know that the whole process is handled by a conveyancing solicitor. Both you and the buyer will have a solicitor on their side to manage the transaction.
When choosing the right solicitor, ask family, friends, and neighbours about the professionals they’ve used in the past for home sale transactions.
Your estate agent may recommend a professional, but keep in mind that they may get a commission from those they refer, so you may not get the right person for your needs.
When researching solicitors, consider several factors. Find out what kind of communication you can expect throughout the process. There is a lot of paperwork involved, so you want someone easy to reach and who can answer any questions you have.
Make sure you look at the fees. They can range from £850-£1500, and there may be other costs. Understand what you will be charged for and when.
Some solicitors may have a no sale, no fee arrangement, so if the sale falls through, you don’t have to pay legal fees. You may want to look into this option if you’re concerned about the completion of the sale.
To speed up the sale of your home, find a conveyancing solicitor as soon as possible. Once you decide to list your property, start looking for the best solicitor to meet your needs. The earlier you reserve one, the sooner you can move ahead with the sale.
The Process
Ready to understand the process of conveyancing? When the sale of your home is finalised, you can celebrate the completion of eight steps.
Step 1:
The first step in the process, following your selection of a conveyancing solicitor, is to instruct them to begin. This should take place right after you have received an offer on your home that you are happy with.
Simply contact them to provide the relevant information and to let them know you are ready to get underway.
Step 2:
The next step requires some effort from you. You must fill out several detailed questionnaires about your home and the components of the sale.
Your solicitor will send you these questionnaires, and before you complete them, you must find some required documents to sell your home, including:
- Proof of Identity: Everyone involved must verify their identity to ensure the transaction is legitimate. You will need your driver’s license or passport, as well as proof of your current address, such as a bank statement or utility bill.
- Title Documentation: When you bought your home, you should have received the title. The Land Registry should have sent the title deeds to your conveyancing solicitor when you bought the property. They should have then sent the documentation to you.
- EPC: Homes bought in the last decade should have an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC). You can retrieve your EPC from the EPC retrieval page. If you do not have one, an energy assessor must come to your property and provide you with one.
- Leasehold Paperwork: Some properties are leasehold, and in those cases, you must find the lease. The estate agent should have included this in their marketing materials. Keep in mind that most mortgages don’t cover leases with fewer than 80 years, so you should discuss this with a lender. information.
- Warranties: Properties built in the past ten years should have a variety of new home policies and warranty documents associated with them. You should have your Buildmark ready for review.
- Gas Safety Certificate: A Gas Safe registered engineer should have provided you with this certification, proving your boiler has been checked and is safe. You are not legally obligated to provide this document when selling, but it is recommended, as it may convince buyers to purchase your home.
- Part P Building Regulation Certificate: If you made changes to the home wiring since 2005, you must have this certification. It proves new electrical work meets current legal standards. If you can’t find the certification, your electrician should have a copy.
- Window Certifications: Replacement windows should come with either a FENSA or CERTASS certificate, proving they meet building regulations.
- Planning Permission and Certification: If you made changes to the property, you must show consent in the form of planning permission, Building Regulations approvals, and completion certificates. You must also give details of the work done if you don’t have the paperwork.
- Additional Guarantees: Any work done to your home, such as treating damp must be documented. You must provide the homeowner with guarantees of all the work done. If you are leaving fixtures and fittings behind, you should leave the warranties, too.
The questionnaires vary, but the minimum you must fill out is the TA6 form. This covers the property’s boundary, any disputes or complaints (such as problematic neighbours), new developments (like an additional train station), council taxes, building works, utility companies, sewerage, and your contact details.
If the property is leasehold or freehold, you must fill out other paperwork. This is also true if you are including fittings and fixtures.
Most people must fill out a TA13, which includes details needed to finalise the sale, such as when and how the keys will be handed over and how mortgages and liability claims can be cleared.
All forms you complete must contain information that is true to the best of your knowledge. If it is later discovered that you lied on a form, you may be subject to legal action and have to pay compensation.
Step 3:
A draft contract is a key part of the process. The conveyancing solicitor will use your supplied information to create a draft contract, which they will then send to the buyer’s solicitor for approval.
The date of completion, the fixtures to be included, the amount needed for the fixtures, and who is responsible for paying for any issues found in the survey are all points that are often disputed. You must agree to the contract before it is sent to the buyer’s solicitor.
Step 4:
Once the contract has been sent to the buyer’s solicitor, it’s time to wait. If they have any changes, they’ll send it back.
Your solicitor will then notify you about those changes and take care of any negotiations on your behalf.
Step 5:
Once a contract is agreed upon by both parties, mortgage repayment is the next step. Before exchanging contracts, you must request a redemption figure from the company.
This figure will tell you how much you need to pay the company once the sale is finalized. Your lawyer can usually obtain this number for you.
Step 6:
Once contracts are exchanged, your solicitors will work together to ensure this happens on a designated date and time.
If you are part of a property chain (where one sale is contingent on another, such as your house being sold and the buyer’s house being sold), then the same thing occurs, provided the chain is moving forward.
After the contracts are exchanged, you are legally obligated to sell the property according to the terms outlined in the contract. If the buyer backs out at this point, you will be able to keep their deposit.
Step 7:
You’ll receive the deposit, usually 10% of the purchase price, as soon as the contracts are exchanged. Now that you own the property until the completion date, you can start organising your move.
Step 8:
On completion day, you’ve reached the final stage of the process. You pass the keys to your home over to the new owner. Your solicitor gets the remainder of the sale money, gives you all the paperwork you gathered and pays off your mortgage.
Following that, the solicitor must be paid from the proceeds, and so should the estate agent. That’s the end of it.
How Long Does It All Take?
The conveyancing process can be tiresome and bewildering, but it is essential to do before you sell your house. On average, it takes around 12 to 16 weeks to complete. Generally, the initial stage, until the draft agreement is done, takes about two weeks.
After that, it takes up to four weeks for the buyer to arrange their financing. It may take up to ten weeks to finalise the contract, review the survey report and do the local searches. Once that is done, it usually takes a week to exchange contracts and complete the transaction.
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