How to Speed Up the Conveyancing Process

When it comes to buying a property, one of the most frustrating aspects of the purchase tends to be the lengthy conveyancing process. While conveyancing is an essential practice which protects both the buyer and the seller, the time between making an offer and completion of a purchase normally takes around 12 to 16 weeks. Sometimes, the process can take even longer when there are delays or the property is part of a chain. 

Buyers often experience a great deal of stress and anxiety during this time, particularly if they have to move out of their current home by a specific date. The pressure on buyers has been so great, that the UK Government even launched a Call to Evidence in 2017, to see how the process of buying a home could be made more efficient.

Whilst conveyancing solicitors, estate agents, and even the UK government are searching for ways to speed up the conveyancing process, there are also a number of things that buyers and sellers can do. Our conveyancing team have put together this handy guide, detailing the top things you can do as a seller to speed up the purchase of your house.

What steps are included in the conveyancing process?

Once an offer has been made on a property, and accepted by the seller, the buyer can instruct their solicitor to begin the conveyancing process. The steps may differ slightly depending on a number of factors, such as the type of property, the location, and whether it is a leasehold. However, the main steps of the conveyancing process are:

• Drafting contracts and making enquiries. Your solicitor will examine your draft contract and make amendments, as well as conducting their pre-survey checks on the property.

• Conducting a survey of the property. There are a number of different survey types, depending on the needs of the buyer, and how in-depth they would like the survey of the property to be. Although home surveys are optional, it is strongly recommended that you have one performed on any property you are considering buying.

• Property searches. Your conveyancer will also conduct several property searches, to ensure there is nothing else about the property you should be aware of (for instance, if it is a flood risk, any large works are planned nearby, etc.). Land registry and local authority searches are the ones you may be most familiar with.

• Mortgage valuation and application. If you’re applying for a mortgage, it’s likely that your lender will arrange for a valuation to be done on the property, separate from the home surveys, to ensure that the property provides sufficient security for a loan. If your lender is satisfied that the property is worth the proposed amount, and that you will be able to complete the mortgage payments, your application for credit should be granted.

• Finalising, signing and exchanging contracts. Once both parties involved in the sale, and their solicitors, are satisfied with the proposed contract of sale, these can be signed and then exchanged to make the sale legally binding. Once contracts have been exchanged, there is no backing out of the sale without one of the parties incurring significant financial costs.

• Payment of required funds. Once contracts have been exchanged, the buyer’s solicitor will pay the deposit for the property to the seller, and funds can be redeemed from the lender (if the buyer has taken a mortgage on the property).

• Completion of sale. Once all the paperwork for the sale has been processed, and funds sent over to the seller, the sale is ready to complete. 

Completion day is typically an exciting time, following a long and involved conveyancing process that is likely to have taken several weeks. However, it’s worth bearing in mind how essential and important each of these steps are to ensure that the sale is conducted legally, and the interests of the buyer and seller, as well as any third parties, are protected.

How long does the conveyancing process normally take?

The average time taken to complete the conveyancing process in the UK is between 12 and 16 weeks. However, if your solicitor comes across any issues during the conveyancing process, or there are other delays such as unresponsive sellers or property searches taking longer than usual to be returned, conveyancing can take even longer. 

Conveyancing lead times can vary based on a number of factors, such as high demand meaning that local authorities take longer to respond to property searches, or even events that are wholly unexpected. For instance, the COVID-19 pandemic caused significant backlogs and disruptions to the property sector, meaning that people were waiting weeks or even months longer than planned for their purchase to complete. 

While your solicitor will do everything in their power to ensure the conveyancing process goes smoothly, unfortunately there are often things that are out of anybody’s control that can affect the conveyancing of your new home.  

How long does the conveyancing process take when there’s no chain?

Buying a property when there is no chain will often mean that the buyer and seller will enjoy a quicker conveyancing process. A chain is when multiple buyers and sellers are linked together, due to their property transactions all depending on one another. 

For instance, a seller may have to wait longer for their sale to complete, if their buyer is awaiting funds from the sale of their own home. When multiple house sales and purchases are linked together in this way, a delay at any point in the chain can have a knock-on effect on other buyers and sellers. 

One of the reasons that first-time buyers are often an attractive prospect for a seller, is that they have typically been pre-approved for a mortgage and are not going through the process of selling their own property. Similarly, a seller who has already secured a property to move into and is not waiting for that sale to complete, won’t be relying on a third party for the sale of their current property to go forwards.

If everything goes well and there are no chains involved, the conveyancing process can be completed in as little as 4 weeks. However, we’d always advise our clients to plan for the average conveyancing time of 12 weeks or more, to be on the safer side.

Why does conveyancing take so long?

The conveyancing process can feel lengthy as so many steps must be taken to ensure the legal sale and purchase of a home. Many of these steps are undertaken by solicitors, with clients having limited visibility over the process. This is why the conveyancing team at Anthony Gold pride ourselves on keeping regular communication with clients and communicating any delays in a timely manner.

Unfortunately, delays can often occur during the conveyancing process. Sometimes this is due to the involvement of so many parties, such as the local authority and the seller’s solicitor. However, sometimes it may be that one of the property searches has uncovered an issue with the home that will need to be communicated back to the buyer.

Common things that delay the conveyancing process

Conveyancing transactions are commonly delayed due to:

• Defective title or lease – For example, an old lease or a right/restriction on a title may be unacceptable for buyers or their lenders today.
• An incomplete chain – You may have found your dream home, but your sellers may not have found theirs yet.
• Lease extensions simultaneous with a sale – There are many different routes to extend your lease, and most take time due to the additional correspondence with the Landlord (or their solicitor) and considerations as to funding the lease extension. Any purchaser will also want to ensure that the terms of the extended lease are acceptable to them, and so will any lender.
• Property searches. As solicitors rely on responses from third parties when conducting property searches, this is one step which can often cause delays in the process. For sentence, if a Local Authority is experiencing a high demand for searches, they may have a backlog of requests that they need to work through, causing sales to be delayed.
• Communication with seller’s solicitors. Sometimes, even if your own conveyancing solicitor is very responsive, delays may come from the seller’s side if their solicitor isn’t quick to respond at the stages where their input is needed. An experienced conveyancer will have strategies to deal with this, but it may still result in unfortunate delays on the way to completion.

What can I do to speed up the conveyancing process?

Although there are some steps of the conveyancing process which are out of the buyer’s control, there are a number of things you can do to ensure that the parts which require your input run smoothly and efficiently. Here are a few tips that we recommend:

• Make sure the admin is done – Provide your ID, sign the authorisation to commence work and confirm all of your details and provide all paperwork you hold in relation to the property as soon as possible.
• If you are buying and selling, wherever possible, use the same solicitor for the sale and purchase. Having one lawyer manage both your sale and purchase will reduce the time taken up by having to correspond with a third party. If a solicitor has access to the details for both transactions, they can complete the necessary paperwork much more quickly than two separate conveyancers.
• Get ahead of your paperwork. For instance, when selling a property, complete and return your Property Information Forms and supporting documents to your lawyer, even before you have accepted an offer. Check with your solicitor to see if there are any other key forms or documents you can prepare in advance.
• Seek pre-approval from your lender. Buyers should confirm how they are funding their purchase and obtain an offer in principle as soon as possible. If funds are coming from another source, such as a Help to Buy Scheme or family member, provide as much detail as possible to your solicitor at the outset of the transaction.

 What documents do I need for conveyancing?

Once you instruct a conveyancing solicitor, their next step should be to inform you of the documents and details you’ll need to provide for them to begin work on the conveyancing process. 

Once you instruct a conveyancing solicitor, their next step should be to inform you of the documents and details you’ll need to provide for them to begin work on the conveyancing process. 

At Anthony Gold, we provide our clients with a retainer letter which details all the documents we will need, and how to share them (for instance, if they need to be brought into the office, and whether they need to be originals, or whether certified copies will suffice).

The key document that we require for all clients in order to begin their conveyancing process is a photo ID, as well as proof of their current address. For the photo ID, a driving licence or passport will be sufficient, whereas proof of address can be confirmed with a council tax bill or a bank statement, provided the address on it matches the address on the ID.

This is an essential step which should be taken by your solicitor to protect against fraud. Property fraud is when somebody illegally obtains ownership of a property by impersonating the owner, and forged documents and false identification are often used in fraud schemes like these. At Anthony Gold, our conveyancing team are vigilant against these types of schemes, and we are also fortunate to have solicitors in our firm who specialise in property fraud.

We have also summarised which documents you’ll need for your conveyancing transaction in this helpful video, which we’ll include below.

What can my solicitor do to streamline the conveyancing process?

At Anthony Gold, we have refined our conveyancing process over more than 70 years of practice. Our team of experienced conveyancing solicitors are adept at navigating the complex steps required to take our clients from initial offer to completion on their property purchases.

Here are just some of the ways that we have streamlined our conveyancing service:

• One solicitor managing your conveyancing timeline. While you may occasionally receive emails from your solicitor’s assistant or paralegal to speed up communication, your solicitor will be the one managing your purchase. Therefore, they will have a full and comprehensive understanding of your transaction, as well as any others relating to it (for instance, if your property is in a chain).
• Transparency about conveyancing fees. We aim to provide you with an estimate of the work included in your transaction, together with a breakdown of disbursements and anything which may incur an additional fee. This includes the drafting of deeds of covenant or trust documents. 
• Professional relationships with lenders. We are on the panels of all the major lenders, and several smaller lenders too. This means that we can work closely with lenders, streamlining the process by answering their enquiries and dealing with their requirements directly, without going through a third-party solicitor. We also receive mortgage funds on completion (usually the working day beforehand), meaning there is less time to wait between exchange of contracts and the completion of your sale.
• Benefits of a multiservice law firm. By working closely with specialists in our other departments, we are able to reliably advise you on a wide range of aspects and factors relating to your sale or purchase. We work alongside our leasehold enfranchisement, housing, family law, and probate departments to ensure that your interests are protected at every turn.
• Resources and support for first-time and experienced buyers. With Anthony Gold, you don’t just benefit from our team’s expertise, but also our helpful resources, such as our Guide to buying and selling residential property, which comes attached to every estimate. We’re here to offer advice and support throughout the whole process, whether you’re a first-time buyer or long-time homeowner. 
• A proactive and attentive team. Our solicitors are driven to bring your purchase to completion as efficiently as possible, and will take steps to be as proactive as possible. For instance, we send the property information forms to sellers as soon as they instruct us, even if this is before they have found a buyer. This means when a buyer is found, they can be sent with the draft contract and Land Registry title documents as soon as we receive the memorandum of sale from the estate agent.
• Facilitating quick communication between buyers and sellers. When acting for buyers we forward all the information to the buyer once received, and compile the ‘report on title’ once we have received all the documents, including searches and replies to enquiries. This means that if the buyer has any questions for the seller, these can be forwarded early in the transaction so they can be addressed and resolved.

How Anthony Gold can help

If you’d like to speak to a member of our expert conveyancing team about how we can help to manage your next sale or purchase of a property, contact us via the form on our homepage, and we’ll be in touch shortly. Or, visit our contact page for other ways that you can get in touch.

If you enjoyed this handy guide and would like to read other articles from our team of solicitors, feel free to browse the Anthony Gold blog for more insights on buying a property, selling, and much more. 

* Disclaimer: The information on the Anthony Gold website is for general information only and reflects the position at the date of publication. It does not constitute legal advice and should not be treated as such. It is provided without any representations or warranties, express or implied.*