Purchasing Property

We hope that the following brief outline of the legal side of a purchase will be of assistance to you. Obviously, your own purchase may be slightly different, so if you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.

On your instruction

Once you have instructed us to act for you, we will write to the solicitors acting for the Seller of the property to ask them for the contract documentation.

The Seller's solicitors will provide various property information forms and a list of items to be included in the sale price, a copy will be sent to you to check. These documents will form part of the contract and it is important that you do check them carefully.

On receipt of your mortgage offer

Once we have received:

a) a copy of your mortgage offer

b) all necessary documentation from the Seller's solicitors

c) the Home Information Pack (HIP)

We will make an appointment for you to come in and discuss your purchase. Normally, the deposit (being the difference between the amount you borrow on mortgage and the purchase price or alternatively 10% of the purchase price) will also be required at that meeting. We will discuss a suggested completion date with you and assuming that there are no queries which need to be resolved, you will be asked to sign the contract. Assuming the other parties in the chain are ready, we will then proceed to exchange of contracts.

Exchange of contracts

Exchange is the point at which you become legally obliged to purchase the property and it is at this time that a suggested completion date becomes final. Please do not book holidays, removals etc until exchange has taken place as suggested completion dates often change. It will not be possible to change the date once exchange has taken place. If for any reason you are unable to complete on the date specified, you will be liable under the Contract to pay interest and possibly expenses incurred by the Seller by way of compensation. It is obviously vital that a realistic completion date is set and normally one to two weeks are required between exchange of contracts and completion to finalise the legal side. Please bear this in mind when discussing dates with the rest of the chain.

Following exchange of contracts

We will request the mortgage monies from your Lender. The nearer to the beginning of the month you complete, the greater your first mortgage payment will be as an additional charge will be made for the period between the date on which you complete and the end of the month.

Following completion, your Lender will write to you to inform you of the amount of your first repayment and when it is due. Any new Life Assurance will need to be put on risk with effect from the date of exchange and you must therefore ensure that any life policies you are having arranged are ready to be put into effect before committing yourself to exchange.

We draft a Deed of Transfer, which is approved by the Seller's solicitors. This will then need to be signed by you, along with the mortgage documentation. Further searches are made and it may be necessary for you to certify that entries revealed by the searches do not relate to you.

Funds required

Between exchange of contracts and completion, we will write to you with our bill and a statement showing the financial side of your purchase and the amount due from you in order to complete. It is vital that funds are received at least 4 working days before completion so that we have cleared funds to be able to complete.