The The Hale conveyancing lawyers that I recently instructed on my house acquisition in The Hale have without warning closed. They were on acting for me because I needed a lawyer on the Bank of Ireland conveyancing panel and my preferred The Hale lawyer was not. I paid them money on account. What do I do now?

If you have an estate agent involved then inform them immediately so that they advise the vendors that there may be a slight delay due to reasons beyond your control. Hopefully they will be sympathetic and urge their lawyer to send a new set of papers to your new solicitors. You will need to 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 lawyers may be able to help.

I moved into my flat on 16 August and the transaction details are still not registered. Need I be worried? My conveyancing solicitor in The Hale expressed confidence that it should be recorded in a couple of weeks. Are properties in The Hale particularly slow to register?

There is nothing unique when it comes to conveyancing in The Hale registration formalities. As opposed to being determined by geographic area, timescales can differ subject to who lodges the application, whether it is in order and if the Land registry communicate with any 3rd parties. At present in the region of three quarters of submission are fully addressed in less than three weeks but occasionally there can be extensive hold-ups. Registration occurs once the new owner is living at the property thus an expedited registration is not usually primary concern but if there is a degree of urgency associated with the registration then you or your conveyancer must contact the land registry and explain the circumstances.

Just had an offer accepted on a new build apartment in The Hale. Conveyancing is a frightening process at the best of times but I have never purchased a new build flat before. What sort of enquires would be asked in new build legal work.

Here is a sample of a few leasehold new build questions that you can expect your new-build leasehold conveyancing in The Hale

Investor purchasers must be able to freely grant unsecured tenancies at market rents without requiring any consents. Please confirm the Lease plans are architect prepared. Where service of notices and proceedings can be at the property demised please confirm that this can be amended to include simultaneous services at the Lessees’ solicitors’ offices where the Lessee from time to time is not resident in the UK - such solicitors may be varied by notice in writing to the Landlord from time to time but otherwise will be as previously specified. The Landlord must covenant to assume the management if the Management Company goes into liquidation or otherwise defaults in running the management scheme. Forfeiture - bankruptcy or liquidation must not apply under this provision.

Frank (my husband) and I may need to rent out our The Hale basement flat temporarily due to a new job. We instructed a The Hale conveyancing firm in 2004 but they have since shut and we did not think at the time seek any guidance as to whether the lease prohibits the subletting of the flat. How do we find out?

Some leases for properties in The Hale do contain a provision to say that subletting is only permitted with prior consent from the landlord. The landlord cannot unreasonably withhold but, in such cases, they would need to review references. Experience suggests that problems are usually caused by unsatisfactory tenants rather than owner-occupiers and for that reason you can expect the freeholder to take up the references and consider them carefully before granting consent.

I am the registered owner of a garden flat in The Hale. Given that I can not reach agreement with the freeholder, can the Leasehold valuation Tribunal determine the sum due for the purchase of the freehold?

in cases where there is a missing landlord or if there is dispute about the premium for a lease extension, under the relevant statutes it is possible to make an application to the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) to judgment on the amount due.

An example of a Lease Extension case for a The Hale flat is 20 Orchard Court Stonegrove in June 2009. The tribunal decided that a premium of £11,040 should be payable for the new lease This case related to 1 flat. The unexpired residue of the current lease was 71.55 years.

A licensed conveyancer handled my conveyancing in The Hale half a dozen years ago having archived my deeds but has since been shut down – What steps do I now take to get hold of these?

Deeds, as such, no longer exist as most properties in The Hale are archived digitally at Land Registry. Should you need to establish evidence of proprietorship or are disposing of or refinancing your property lawyer will need to obtain up to date copies of the register from the Land Registry in any case.

If you feel there may be other documents or you have any other queries please e-mail your request with details of the transaction and documents you need to filerequest@clc-uk.org. The CLC will let you know what information they have and any additional information they may need before they are in a position to identify and send the documents to you. Following an intervention it may take some time for the CLC to access archived files and documents, but your request will be actioned as quickly as possible.