FAQs - Selling
ARTICLES AND FAQS
Some of the things people ask and problems they have, with our comments and answers.
Should I agree to the estate agents having 16 or 20 weeks as sole agents to sell my property?
Unfortunately some agents try to flatter you by agreeing to take your property on for a price which they really think is too high. If they sign you up for a long period, then after a month or so of no viewings they can suggest you reduce the price, and you are stuck with them
You would have been better to have asked at what price they would market the property if they only had 4-6 weeks. Then they would be more realistic and you would get viewers more easily.
If you use more than one agent at the same time, they all generally charge you more.
If you change agents, sometimes the first agent will try to claim commission for people he has "introduced" who later negotiate with the new agents. Ideally you should get a list of those the first agent says he has "introduced" and ask the second agent not to deal with them, but refer them back to the first agent, otherwise you may be stuck with two sets of commission!
What's the difference between Registered and Unregistered Land? Does it matter my property is "unregistered"?
Land is unregistered because it hasn't changed hands since before compulsory registration of title came in for the area in question. It started in Inner London over 100 years ago but didn't get going in earnest until the 1960s-70s when large cities and many towns were made compulsory areas. It didn't affect many rural areas until the 1980s but by December 1990 every part of England & Wales was subject to compulsory registration.
However there is still a lot of land, particularly in rural areas that is still unregistered. Some factory conveyancers get confused when asked to deal with unregistered land, because they are not used to it. There is more work, because we have to check through lots of different documents rather than having it all centralised in one place on the registers kept by the Land Registry.
You do not have to register your land to sell it, unless the title is incredibly complicated, which for most domestic properties is very unlikely. In most cases there is a little extra work but in terms of the overall time taken on a transaction, generally this is not very significant, and this practice does not normally make any extra charge because a title is unregistered.
I am selling a flat. Why have you asked me for more money for a Landlord's Information Fee? It is more than on your estimate.
The buyer's solicitor will want a lot of answers and copy documents that only the landlord or his managing agent can provide, and we have no choice but to pay their fees for this. When we give you an estimate for the sale of a flat we can only make an inspired guess as to the likely level of these fees which can vary from nothing in the case of a landlord which is a company owned by the flat owners to £300 or so in the case of some large national managing agents. Sometimes we have to pay fees to more than one such concern to obtain different bits of information
We have no control whatever over these charges and refusing to give us the money simply slows down the process.
>I am selling my shared freehold flat, and the buyers say that they need the lease to be extended. Why's this, if it is shared freehold?
You may share the ownership of the freehold between you in some way, either directly, or through a trust or a company, but that still means that you will have leases for your individual flats.
When a lease gets too short for mortgage lenders to lend on it, it will have to be extended. Hopefully you can get the other co-freeholders to to agree to sign a deed extending the lease without too much trouble or cost. Theirs may need to be extended too!
There is a lot more detailed explanation on the Shared Freehold Flats page and the pages linked from it.
My buyer wants to see the building regulation paperwork for some work that was done several years ago. I haven't got it - should I contact the Council about this?
If you are absolutely sure that the work was checked by the building inspector and a completion certificate was issued then you could get a copy from the Council.
Trouble is that if you contact the Council's Building Control section about it, and the work does not comply, or has not a completion certificate, then you have just lost the alternative of offering a Building Regulation Indemnity Policy. These pay out in the very unlikely event of the Council taking enforcement action, which they generally don't do after the work is a year or two old, but they still have the theoretical right to do this. Insurers won't provide the cover if you have warned the Council. As the likelihood of enforcement action is normally very small after a few years, these polices are mainly to satisfy mortgage lenders and their solicitors.
You'll find more explanation about these policies in a section on our Jargon Buster page
When will get my money after my sale has been completed?
We will normally send you the money by cheque no later than the working day following completion, and very often on the afternoon of the day of completion, or you can call in to pick it up by arrangement.
If you let us know beforehand with full bank account details we can make an electronic transfer which costs a further £30 plus VAT
Copyright: Richard Webster & Co 2010
Richard Webster & Co 30 Leigh Road Eastleigh Hampshire SO50 9DT
Conveyancing Frequently Asked Questions - Solicitors for the Southampton area, South Hampshire and Wiltshire.
Page Last Revised 13/03/12