We were just about to exchange contracts for a property in Westbury On Trym. We encountered a stumbling block. Our mortgage offer with Britannia expires on 17/11/2025 but the sellers are putting forward a completion date of 19/11/2025. Is it possible to extend the mortgage offer?
The best person to address this question is your solicitors who is in a position to calculate if they should be discussing with the mortgage company, seller’s lawyers, selling agents or indeed all three given what has gone on in your conveyancing to date.
I appreciate that there are debates on Chancel Insurance on online forums. Do I need this when purchasing a house in Westbury On Trym? or I am told that there is historic law that means some homeowners residing in a parish church boundary will be compelled to pay for repairs to the chancel within the church. Is this relevant for conveyancing in Westbury On Trym?
Unless a prior purchase of the house completed after 12 October 2013 you could expect lawyers conducting conveyancing in Westbury On Trym to continue to recommend a chancel search and or chancel repair liability policy.
4 months have gone by following my purchase conveyancing in Westbury On Trym completed. I have checked the Land Registry site which shows that I paid £150,000 when infact I paid £170,000. Why the discrepancy?
The price paid figure is taken from the application to register the purchase. It is the figure included in the Transfer (the legal deed which transfers the property from one person to the other) and referred to as the 'consideration' or purchase price. You can report an error in the price paid figure using the LR online form. In most cases errors result from typos so at first glance the figure. Do report it so they can double check and advise.
I have been on the look out for a leasehold apartment up to £235,500 and identified one close by in Westbury On Trym I like with a park and railway links nearby, the downside is that it's only got 61 remaining years left on the lease. I can't really find anything else in Westbury On Trym for this price, so just wondered if I would be making a mistake acquiring a lease with such few years left?
Should you need a mortgage that many years may be problematic. Discount the offer by the expected lease extension will cost if not already taken into account. If the current proprietor has owned the property for a minimum of twenty four months you can request that they start the process of the extension and then assign it to you. You can add 90 years to the current lease term with a zero ground rent applied. You should consult your conveyancing lawyer concerning this.
My partner and I are acquiring a ground floor flat in Westbury On Trym. At the time of instructing our conveyancing practitioner, they assured us that they were on all mainstream bank panels. The financial adviser emailed yesterday to advise that they don't seem to be on the Skipton approved list. Should that be true, what should we do? Do we simply choose a different lawyer that is on their approved list or do we cover the costs for separate representation, with Skipton selecting their own approved solicitor.
If you are purchasing a property requiring a mortgage it is usual for the buyer’s solicitors to also represent the mortgage company. In order to act for a bank or building society a lawyer has to be on that lender's list of approved lawyers. An application has to be made by the property lawyer to the lender to become a member of the lender's panel and there are increasingly strict criteria which the solicitor has to satisfy. Some building societies now require their panel members to be part of the Law Society’s Conveyancing Accreditation Scheme. Your solicitor should contact Skipton to find out if they can apply for membership of their conveyancing panel, but if that is not viable they will instruct their own lawyers to represent them. You don't have to instruct a firm on Skipton's conveyancing panel and you may continue to use your own Westbury On Trym solicitors, in which case your legal fees may increase, and it will likely delay the transaction as you are adding another conveyancing practitioner into the mix.