To think buying and selling homes could be made much much simpler..

[Hungrycaterpillarsmummy]

If there was a sort of "legal database" where only solicitors can access and it would show all previous documents relating to a property so there is no faff of going back and forth between solicitors.
I'm having to provide building warrants and applications, affadavits for road access etc which was obviously already done when we bought the property. Now we are going through it all again using a different solicitor for the sale.

Also the jargon ..surely the jargon could be modernised?! I just had an email saying "I see that you have emailed further requesting a mandate, I will get my colleague to prepare same and forward onto you."

Prepare the same! Honestly..

Maybe I am being unreasonable but it's such a fucking fafffffff.

Couldn’t agree more, we are just in the process of moving, the paperwork, unbelievable, one of the forms asked us to confirm we aren’t members of or related to the royal family or a lord/ lady. We have no mortgage and are funding the purchase entirely through the sale of current home but they still ask for proof of funds. Do agree though the estate agent fees are far worse than the solicitor

I live in France and this is exactly how it works. You make an offer. If accepted you both have a seven day cooling off period where either party can pull out. After that you sign a contract to buy and if either of you pull out, you pay 10% of the purchase price!
It's SO LOGICAL and so much quicker than England. The system there is archaic and crazy.

one of the forms asked us to confirm we aren’t members of or related to the royal family or a lord/ lady.

That will be to comply with anti-bribery/money laundering requirements. Solicitors don't ask for this stuff for fun!

Some people do keep chickens though, don't they, which is why someone put that restriction on the property in the first place and also why your solicitor had to tell you about it

Exactly- @AcquadiP it's all very well and good you being amused by the restrictive covenant being irrelevant to you (and some of the older ones can seem very funny, granted!), but who would you have blamed if you didn't know and had wanted to keep chickens, and it turned out that the person who has the benefit of the covenant still lived next door and wanted to enforce it?...

Regarding the language - there's absolutely no excuse for using opaque or complex language.
I started working as a solicitor decades ago and even then the push to use clear and simple language had been going on for a long time.

Any decent lawyer should be able to explain things in a way their client can understand

Absolutely agree.
Being able to explain to your client clearly is a crucial part of the role.
One that's clearly not being fulfilled, given the number of people on this thread who simply don't understand what's going on or how things work. Not their fault, it clearly wasn't explained properly to them!

Er, it's a house in a small market town, not a small holding. It would be completely inappropriate to keep hens, goats, pigs, ponies or any other animal which belong in a rural or semi-rural environment. And this phone call took place in week 7. How long does it take to discover a restrictive covenant? Too long, evidently.

Doesn't matter.
You could still sue her if she didn't ask the question.

Buying & selling via property auction is quicker

I have done this

So if someone has a sudden change of circumstances i.e. death of partner, becoming too unwell to work, redundancy etc. They should be financially penalised?

The Scottish system is now no better than the English system

That's the same here after exchange of contracts. And of course it is, because the seller is incurring costs and making plans too. That's the point you become contractually bound to buy, everyone needs a point of certainty so they can book removal men, school places etc

It is, but you really need to know what you are doing.
I was reading an old file at work recently and there was a frantic string of emails from someone who had paid over the odds at auction for something they didn't understand and was desperately trying to reverse it.

It would be inefficient for a solicitor (or more likely, conveyancer) to look at each document as they arrive. They tend to collect them all in and then prepare their report on title. And yes, some times the title documents with the details in do take longer to arrive than the basic documents. Sometimes land registry don't have copies and you have to wait for sellers to dig around for them.

You are just showing your ignorance of the process here (am a commercial property solicitor, I do come across some bad conveyancers but your example is not a good one)

Yes, I thought you might be. Relating the hen story was intended to make people smile not berate your profession.🙄

The issue is that the cost people are willing to pay for conveyancing has been driven to the ground. Therefore conveyancers have to take on 100s of cases each to make the work worthwhile which just slows everything down.

Lots of the work has been farmed out to conveyancing factories with less skilled people doing the work. All the while, the legal issues to consider are mounting up - leasehold, building safety, anti money laundering etc. It is therefore much slower as too many files and not enough time enough skilled people doing the job.

People will spend 1000s on an estate agent for some photos to be put on right
move but don’t think solicitors / conveyancers are worth the money.

There’s a lot of risk involved for conveyancers so insurance costs are high. Until it is recognised as a skill people are willing to pay for, nothing will change.

I live in the US and just brought our first home....the process here is straightforward and fast, 1 month from acceptance to keys. The English system baffles me, my colleague had an offer accepted in October and he said he would be lucky to move in before May! Mind blown!

The French and NZ systems sound intriguing.

I have bought and sold in America, where we moved to before coming to the UK. Leaving out the very high EA commission fees, the system there is also much better. The key feature is that when you make an offer you accompany it with a deposit called ‘earnest money’, 5-10% of the purchase price. You include a list of caveats for the deposit to be retained and the sale to proceed, which the seller may accept, reject, or negotiate.

Top of the list, the price is fixed and the house comes off the market. Courts take a dim view of any attempt to mess about with this and it just doesn’t happen. There is a written, legally binding timetable for all steps to the close of sale (which may be modified in emergencies). If either party violates, the other has the option to cancel the sale (with return of the deposit). Much less gentlemanly, but much more effective.

TBF, the (good) EAs work a lot harder.

No, reread your first post. You were saying the transaction "couldn't have been more straightforward" and implied the enquiries being raised were a pointless delaying tactic. You only wanted to "make people smile" to have a giggle at the underpaid, overworked paralegals who mostly deal with conveyancing work.

It just made you look ignorant.

I am not a conveyancer but it is boring when people criticise professionals when they don't understand the profession.

No, you were using what you thought was a good example of a solicitor's inefficiency. It wasn't. You just look as if you don't know what you're talking about, nothing wrong with that, after all you're (quite obviously) not a lawyer. What is wrong is spouting off when you don't know what you're talking about.
Why not keep quiet?

The fact is @DameCelia that the process is inefficient. I haven't checked the poll but it was something like 98% in agreement. So you can be as defensive as you like but it's true the process and timescale is pathetic.

I agree it is a total nightmare, I am currently selling on behalf of an elderly parent who has moved into care ... there is no chain, the buyer is not relying on a sale to purchase this house; the SAME solicitor dealt with the house sale to my parent when they purchased (and acted for the seller at the time ... wouldn't be permitted now). But the list of questions and documents I have to provide is endless ... there was a query over land registry ,,. When I asked (politely) why this hadn't been dealt with during the original purchase I was told 'it's a bit of a grey area'. ???
I dread to think how my elderly parent would cope if they did not have me to sort out all these issues ... what happens in such cases?

The process can be inefficient, no one is denying that. The point several of us are trying to make is that there can be many reasons for delays, including in particular estate agents and mortgage providers (and clients themselves). Solicitors can be inefficient too (or just plain incompetent, like any service provider can be!), but it's not a conspiracy to bump up fees, more likely that it's a cheapo firm (often affiliated with the estate agent) offering an unrealistic fixed fee.