Conveyancing Solicitors
Your personal legal advisor will help you through your conveyancing, quickly and painlessly
Helping you to move home
Buying a new home is one of the most important investments of our lives, so it is important that you have the support and guidance of a professional who knows what they are doing. Your conveyancing solicitor will help you through your conveyancing, as quickly and painlessly as possible.
Choosing the right conveyancing solicitor
When buying or selling a property, you should carefully consider whether you need a local or online conveyancing solictor.
At Goughs Solicitors we are the largest solicitors in Wiltshire, with seven offices throughout the county in Calne, Chippenham, Corsham, Devizes, Melksham, Trowbridge and Greenways.
1,500 conveyancing transactions successfully completed in the past year
A personal, dedicated property lawyer
Guaranteed same-day call back
Conveyancing for residential properties
Conveyancing is the legal process of transferring the legal title of a property or piece of land from one owner to another. The process will involve a legal advisor or conveyancing solicitor, which ensures that the property being purchased has no unknown restrictions and that it will sell without any issues in the future.
In residential properties, the process begins when an offer is accepted and ends when the buyer receives the keys. This usually takes around 8-12 weeks, but can vary depending on the property and individuals involved. It can be a very complex process, and requires the assistance of a specialist residential conveyancing solicitor.
The role of a conveyancing solicitor
Conveyancing solicitors look after all the legal work involved in transferring a property to a new owner. It is their responsibility to advise you on the legal details of contracts, deeds and timeframes, and provide bespoke legal advice. Their role includes a wide range of different legal tasks, such as:
Carrying out council searches
Handling the contracts
Transferring the funds
Conducting Property Searches
Conveyancing property searches are enquiries made on behalf of the buyer by their legal representative to various authorities that hold information about the property being purchased, the land it sits on and any other factors that may affect its future value.
They are not always compulsory. If you buy the property with 100% cash, you are free to choose which, if any, search(es) you undertake. However, if you are purchasing a property with a mortgage, the lender will inform the conveyancer what searches need to be completed before they will release the mortgage funds.
Searches required when buying a house
Searches are usually requested once your conveyancer has received the contract pack from the conveyancer acting for the seller.
Property searches usually take anywhere between 10 days to a few months. However, Local Authority searches can take a long time due to staff turnover and industry cutbacks. As well as this, different authorities use different methods to generate and communicate searches, meaning that the turnaround time of these searches can vary significantly across the country.
Local Authority Searches
Local authority searches highlight any planning, building control, highway or pollution issues that a property may have.
Water and Drainage Searches
The Water and Drainage search questions who owns and maintains the sewers, drains and pipes; whether or not the property is connected to a public water supply and sewer; if the water supply is metered or rateable; the location of public sewer and drainage pipes; and whether the owner of the property will need permission from the water company to build an extension.
Environmental Searches
An environmental search covers any flooding, landslide, subsidence or contaminated land matters.
Popular questions about the conveyancing process
The average time that it takes to complete a house sale is between 4 and 6 months. It can take around 10-12 weeks from a new home listing for an offer to be accepted. The conveyancing process usually takes around 12 weeks. The average time scale from the exchange of contracts to completion on the property is up to 2 weeks, but in some cases it can happen on the same day.
Conveyancing fees are the legal costs associated with buying or selling a property. They cover the work that the conveyancing solicitor does to complete the sale or purchase process, including drafting contracts, arranging relevant property searches and managing the transfer of funds. You can expect to pay an average of around £800 – £2,000 for conveyancing fees, depending on a number of important factors.
Leasehold properties are more complicated , and therefore take up more time. That is why conveyancing fees associated with a leasehold sale or purchase will be more expensive than those for a freehold property.
The more complicated the sale or purchase is, the more expensive the conveyancing fees will be. For example, if you are a chain-free cash buyer, this should make it a relatively smooth process, but there are many factors that can contribute towards the process being more complex and time consuming such as complicated legal titles or long chains, and you would likely be charged more in conveyancing fees.
If you are buying and selling properties simultaneously, you will be undertaking two separate conveyancing transactions. Therefore, this will cost more in conveyancing costs than just one single transaction.
Some conveyancing solicitors offer a fixed fee conveyancing service. This means that your legal professional will give you a price at the start of the process, and that is what you will pay for the service, rather than charging by the hour. Disbursements will be charged in addition to this fixed fee, but the conveyancer will be able to give an estimate of these additional costs before they begin.
We don’t have a fixes fee but we quote on a bespoke basis, so additional costs don’t sneak in further down the line.
For a free quote go to our online conveyancing quote form here
There is a common misconception that licensed conveyancers are not as qualified to deal with property than solicitors, however that is not the case.
Licensed conveyancers study conveyancing and land law specifically, and only practise in this area, so they will have an in-depth knowledge and necessary experience to help you with the conveyancing of a property. Therefore, solicitors and conveyancers should be equally skilled at conveyancing.
Many mortgage lenders will require you to use a professional conveyancing solicitor as part of their mortgage offer.
If you are a cash buyer, they are not a legal requirement, however, it could be risky to do the conveyancing without any legal help which could lead to delays and issues further down the line.
Conveyancing is a particularly high risk area of law as there can be issues surrounding the property sale such as; unregistered with the Land Registry, if the sellers are divorcing as well as many other areas.
Searches are necessary to discover any issues before transferring ownership of the property. They are also required by lenders, as they want to be certain that nothing could affect the property’s value before they release the mortgage funds.
The average time scale for searches is anywhere between 10 days to a few months. Typically searches take around two – three weeks, however different factors can impact the time scale, such as the location of the house and how long external bodies can take to produce the required information.
The best way to ensure the searches are carried out swiftly is to ensure you have returned all of your instruction paperwork and money on account so that your conveyancer is able to order the searches as soon as the contract paperwork arrives.
To learn more about searches read our article on; Conveyancing searches: everything you need to know
Our clients rate us as excellent
Corsham
Well-managed transaction handled promptly and professionally. We have used Goughs before, will use again and would not hesitate to recommend
Sue Jenkins
Nadine has been excellent throughout, keeping us regularly informed of all progress and we liked her very practical approach to things. The support staff at Goughs have also been excellent throughout, hence, instructing Goughs on 4 property matters. Nothing too much trouble and all requests were dealt with very swiftly
Devizes
I have used Goughs solicitors for conveyancing on more than one occasion. Extremely efficient and professional and wouldn’t hesitate in recommending them
W D, Calne
Professional, helpful & knowledgeable service. Giving very clear advice in a way I could understand. Thank you.
S, M, Chippenham
The service was professional, efficient and very friendly. I will be using Goughs again.
Sarah Fuller
Brilliant service, I couldn’t fault Goughs and have subsequently gone on to use their services for another purpose.
Meet the Residential Property Team
Trainee Residential Conveyancer
Associate Chartered Legal Executive
Residential Conveyancer
Senior Associate
Solicitor
Licensed Conveyancer
Solicitor
Partner & Notary Public
Associate Solicitor
Senior Associate
Partner and Head of Residential Property
Trainee Residential Conveyancer
Solicitor
Trainee Residential Conveyancer
Licensed Conveyancer
Associate Chartered Legal Executive
Residential Conveyancer
Residential Conveyancer
Solicitor
Partner
Partner & Notary Public
Senior Associate Solicitor
Why Choose Goughs?
Local since 1882, with an excellent reputation
First-class, effective service
Largest solicitors in Wiltshire
Seven offices throughout the county
Nationally accredited law firm
Recognised by Legal 500 and Chambers & Partners
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