Our Real Estate team is made up of highly experienced solicitors who have the legal and technical “know how” to resolve any issues that can arise during the purchasing and selling of high value and complex residential properties.
Everyone in our Real Estate team works full time in property law and do not practice in any other areas of law, additionally any work we undertake for you is supervised by our Real Estate department partners.
We specialise in handling the sale and purchase of high value and complex properties where there are issues such as unregistered and multi title land, lease extensions, restrictive covenants, rights of way, easements or boundary issues, development potential or mixed use, agricultural land and property not linked to mains services. We are able to draw on the wider expertise the firm can provide, such as, tax and estate planning and planning law.
We know that communication is key to serving our clients' needs, so we are always on hand to answer your questions and ensure you are kept up-to-date with everything you need to know.
Why choose LCF Law?
We have an experienced team who understand the stress involved in buying and selling property. Our approach is simple; we provide a first-class service from our expert team who make the difference by removing confusion and uncertainty, dealing with all of the legal details of a property transaction on your behalf. We let you know what your options are and how best to reach your objectives. No jargon. No hidden fees. Law, Fair and Square.
We are proud to hold Lexcel and CQS Accreditation's, issued by the Law Society. This involves the firm undergoing a rigorous audit process which ensures we maintain high levels of client care.
Pricing
The 'one-size-fits-all' model of fixed-fee conveyancing is unsuitable for high value property transactions. The legal work required is simply too varied and complex.
We will take time to understand your needs and the particular circumstances of the property involved and provide you with a summary of the work we anticipate being required and a bespoke fee quote. Purely as a guide a starting point for our legal fees is typically £2,000 plus VAT (the current rate is 20%).
Where it becomes apparent that there is likely to be any additional work required, we will make sure you are informed of this at the earliest opportunity and a clear estimate of those extra costs will be provided.
Details of the relevant hourly rates for our solicitors are available on request.
In addition to our legal fees, there are costs which are payable to third parties (e.g. searches) that you will be asked to cover. The below is not a complete list of all costs that you may have to incur, however most transactions will include some or all of the following:
- Land Registry Copy Title Entries - £3. 60 (inclusive of Vat) per register, plan or document referred to, assuming they are available online from the Land Registry;
- Land Registry application fees – between £20 and £910 depending on the transaction and value involved. We can let you know the amount when we have sufficient detail;
- Bank transfer fees – £42 (inclusive of VAT) per bank transfer;
- Search fees – these depend on the area the property is in and which searches are relevant to the particular transaction, but typically a full set of residential searches costs between £300 and £500.
- Stamp Duty Land Tax (or Land Transaction Tax in Wales) – this will depend entirely on the transaction and taxpayer details, and we can advise on the likely tax due once we have sufficient details to do so. HMRC (or the WRA in Wales) do have helpful calculators available here and here.
All legal fees and costs will include VAT (the current rate is 20%) except where no VAT is applied.
Exclusions
We do not undertake tax advice.
Key Milestones
With every transaction there are key milestones, which may vary according to individual circumstances. Due to the nature of high value and complex properties additional steps may be required but we would expect our legal work to include:
- Taking your instructions and giving you initial advice
- Checking finances are in place to fund purchase and contacting lender's solicitors if needed
- Receiving and advising on contract documents
- Carrying out searches
- Obtaining further planning documentation if required
- Making any necessary enquiries of seller's solicitor
- Giving you advice on all documents and information received
- Going through the conditions of your mortgage offer
- Sending the final contract to you for signature
- Draft Transfer
- Advising you on joint ownership
- Obtaining pre-completion searches
- Agreeing a completion date (the date from which you own the property)
- Exchanging contracts and notifying you that this has happened
- Arranging for all monies needed to be received from lender and you
- Completing purchase
- Dealing with payment of Stamp Duty/Land Tax (if its a purchase)
- Dealing with application for registration at Land Registry
How long will it take?
The sale and purchase of high value and complex properties generally takes longer than a standard conveyance for which the average process takes between 12-20 weeks. We will keep you advised on progress and the likely timeline to completion as the transaction progresses.
Quality as standard
We are committed to providing a high quality legal service to all our clients. When something goes wrong, we need you to tell us about it. This will help us to improve our standards.
If you have a complaint about our delivery of conveyancing services our complaints policy will assist you with who to contact and enable you to understand the procedure that will be followed.
How long will it take?
Our solicitors are ready to help you. Click on Contact Us, use the Contact form above, or send a message direct to one of the team working in this area from their business cards below.
