Conveyancing - changing solicitors only for the purchase

[MovingDilemmas]

Hello,

Our solicitor for the purchase of the house we're buying (man working for a massive massive firm) has been v uncommunicative - not answering questions, answering what he THINKS we're asking rather than what we've actually asked, being unclear (asking a question about borrowing in response to bank details showing evidence of a gift), taking ages to respond etc.

He's just (after being pestered) sent the firm's bank details to us attached to an email, in a word document. This feels incredibly dodgy, open to scams etc and like I no longer trust them to do a good job on the house purchase. Was expecting them to upload it to their portal or send in the post.

However he's already a long way through the 'sale' file (i.e. he's done lots of work on selling our flat).

If we change solicitor JUST for the purchase of the house, but keep him as the solicitor for the sale of our flat, will that cause any issues?

Thanks

Risking yet more communication issues I would have thought. We always use a local small solicitor and they’re always responsive. Why use a big impersonal firm? However a small local one might chase up issues for you.

It's going to be even harder to tie up the sale of one and buying of the other using two different solicitors.

If you can somehow manage to get through it with the difficult guy I would do that.

You never need use him again of course.

I had no idea they were a big impersonal firm tbh. They were the one the estate agent recommended (I know, completely stupid to go with them). My partner was taking exams and I had to make the decision by myself and felt pressured... they also have reasonable reviews online, I guess some of them are competent but some of them are useless.

That would be awkward. Can you ask for someone else in his firm to take over?

As for the bank details, ring and ask the receptionist for them.

Stick with the same one. It was a mistake to use the estate agent recommended one but you know that now, and you’re already committed. Use the estate agent to chase things up too.

The bank details thing is probably nothing but it is a bit insecure - firms I’ve used always say to call and check the bank details before sending any money, so do that.

It’s timing that will be an issue if you use a different firm, in the sense that money moves up the chain to allow completion on the same day, but if it has to come in and go across to a different firm the may not be time to do that in a single day.

I would definitely phone and check that it was actually him that sent those bank details through and that his email hasn’t been hacked by scammers

i think you need to really have the same solicitor for sale and purchase, as it will be become more fraught bringing more players in. And there’s perhaps no guarantee that someone different will do a better job.

I changed!

I terminated with the first guy's company - and he refunded the deposit he held immediately and without question (I think he knew he'd messed up, or maybe we just got lucky and hadn't got to the crucial bits when we had to pay).

Have onboarded a new one who is already 100x better and I'm very happy I pulled the plug on the first. She's way more responsive and has already ordered searches which the previous guy hadn't done 4 weeks in.

Lesson learned - never go with referrals and always use a smaller company, not some massive 1700+ firm. (Also, trust your gut and don't be afraid to complain!)

(Oh and I changed her to be the solicitor both for sale and purchase! So could have been expensive but luckily we didn't have to pay anything to the first after the absolute howler of sending the bank details in an email)