The Conveyancing Process

Storage firms can play a vital role in the conveyancing process – both from the seller’s and the buyer’s point of view.  However, the conveyancing process is not always plain sailing. There are various challenges along the way, with consequential stalls in the timeframe from the start of the house sale to the very end.

This article addresses these matters in a bid to describe the role of removal and storage firms in the conveyancing process and to explain why that process can be so lengthy.

How does it all work when a house is being sold?
Once the parties have agreed to sell and buy a house, solicitors are instructed.  The sellers provide an Energy Performance Certificate and their solicitors get the title deeds and prepare a contract package to send to the buyer’s solicitors.  The buyer’s solicitors’ task is more complicated, as it has to juggle liaising with the seller’s solicitors on the contract package and also the buyer’s mortgage company.  The buyer may also be aided in their purchase by the government backed “Help to Buy”, scheme so a third set of lawyers may be involved.

The purchase of a property is totally reliant on third parties such as the estate agent, surveyors, search providers, the Land Registry, solicitors and also possibly a number of other people involved in other sales if this purchase is part of a chain.
Solicitors tend to get blamed for the delays in the housing transaction but it isn’t always their fault.  When a buyer’s solicitors investigate the title to the property many issues can arise, such as:

• The title may be defective
• The search results may not be clear
• If a commercial property, planning permission may be required for change of use
• The survey may identify problems
• The property may require a full renovation

A buyer and his lender need to be provided with satisfactory solutions to these issues before contracts may be exchanged.  Once contracts have been exchanged the buyer and seller are legally bound to buy and sell respectively.
If the transaction is part of a chain, the buyer and seller need to be happy with what is going on further down the chain before they can exchange their own contracts.  If, for example, the buyer is also selling their own house and this falls through, they are usually no longer free to purchase a new one and therefore won’t proceed to exchange.  Likewise, with the seller.

Some house sales will then go on to “complete” the contract for sale on the same day as contracts are “exchanged”.  Others will have a gap between exchange and completion.  For removal and storage companies, the key time is when the contract “completes,”  as this is the time when the seller moves out and the buyer moves in (or at least takes possession).

Whether there is a gap between exchange and completion or not, both the seller’s and the buyer’s solicitors have a number of things they need to do before completion can take place.  These include, amongst other things:  ensuring there are sufficient monies to pay off any mortgages; carrying out searches; obtaining indemnity insurance policies and preparing completion statements.