Conveyancing solicitors....any recommendations?

[beaver33]

Morning all....DH and I are planning to put in an offer (our first!!) on a property today. We're obv v naive about how the whole thing works, but our main issue is a need to move very quickly.

In a nutshell, I'm nearly 5 months pregnant, and our rental agreement runs out in mid-Feb and we don't want to have to renew for another 6 months.

Can anyone recommend a good, speedy conveyancing solicitor?? I'm told they don't exist, but there must be someone out there who's had a positive experience...

We're in London, but have also been told we can pick a solicitor anywhere in the country - is that right?

Conveyancing - do you homework.

A new website is www.saveandconvey.com

The aim is to choose a website that is actually a panel of Conveyancers you can arrange a call back and establish which searches you require.

Time and time again we all forget that Conveyancers act for us. They research your property to establish any risks that will devalue your property/ investment.

used Homden Property Lawyers in Strood Kent, who were fantastic

Premier properties on line only any good if really really straight forward, otherwise lost of chasing about and you have to do it all!

Interesting that a lot of people seem to use online solicitors as opposed to ones close to them

Just to throw in my two penneth, I contacted 3 firms for fee quotes: one I had used before, one I knew via work and another a firm of conveyancers based near my home address.

The one I had used before rang me on receipt of my email (turned out our buyer had been recommended to use them by the EA, but being a previous client trumped that) and provided a fee quote very quickly. The one via work took several hours to respond and was quite dismissive on the phone when I chased - I got the firm impression he was old school and routed all correspondence via his secretary - and the conveyancers took 3 days to respond and I had already phoned them to chase and then emailed them to tell them I had instructed someone else by then.

I think that how people react to your initial enquiry can be a real indication of the service you will get.

The solicitor I'm using uses email, has a very clued up assistant who works with her to move things along when she is busy and is close enough for me to drop things in to their office.

The best solicitors are the ones you can pick up the phone and speak to or easily email. Too many solicitors hide behind their secretaries or support. I've seen both sides to this and know the difference.

The main challenge people face when they move is they don't really know what is going on. They rely on what people are telling them and when the estate agent says they are putting the property back on the market if they don't sell soon, this can feel really scary.

A good solicitor needs to stand in front of their client protecting them against all of this stress, talking to them and leading them through the conveyancing jungle.

Whether you choose online, offline, cheap, expensive, fat, thin - what you need is a solicitor who is experienced to know what to do when you need it. There aren't many with that kind of an ethos but one which I have worked with and, for me, did what i needed them to was SAM Conveyancing.

I agree that choosing cheap is always a false economy, especially when buying a property worth £100,000s. Good communication and a great relationship will always top 10 weeks of stress and not knowing what is going on which seems to go hand in hand with cheap conveyancing.

Another good resource for getting an idea on costs and prices is Conveyancing Calculator. They have nationwide coverage and are reasonably priced. www.conveyancingcalculator.co.uk

Don't go for the cheapest as many people have said here, but make sure you shop around and compare online and listen to family and friends. If you are going to use your estate agent's recommendation, just ask them this question "Can you tell me how much your referral fee is for recommending this solicitor?" I think you will be shocked!

Any solicitor accepting referrals from a third party has to comply with the SRA regulations and must declare their referral fee from that source. Take a look at the small print and you will see what I mean.

Make sure you use a firm that offers fixed fee conveyancing. Do not get caught out by hidden extras and extra fees. Get a full detailed quote and then compare

Aname - I agree about getting a proper sols We went for the L Conveyancer
and we got the SAME forms /questions from her three times. It nearly drove
us mad. This is especially true if buying say a leasehold/flat (even v experienced
sols can come unstuck here) Sols are trained in dispute handling and they
usually have a whole team of other pros in the building to help as well so if
something crops us help is there It is sols who take cases to court, to get
legal address should a problem occur aswell (and barristers too)

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Plus at how impartial Alessandro is with his recommendation of a law firm sharing his surname...

Foster Law in Skipton. Yes you can use solicitors wherever the transaction is. Carole Conroy.

I would go onto Google and type in Conveyancing quotes.
You have 10 websites to choose from.

Some websites ask for your personal details and some do not to show you a range of quotes. The Homebuyer Conveyancing panel can be found on
www.homebuyerconveyancing.com
www.saveandconvey.com
www.myhouselegalfees.com
www.lenderconveyancing.com

The above websites require no personal details and you can view comparable quotes by price, location and by Mortgage lender.
you can even add Exchange Insurance into the quote.

Hope that helps in you

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I also used SAM conveyancing but had a terrible experience from start (went through all the contract papers and then had to do it again a few days later when I realised SAM weren't actually doing our convencing and we'd have the contract with a subcontractor, Chadwick Lawrence) through giving up on one house because of delays, to finish (finding out that the purchase hadn't been registered although we'd been told it was. We also had to pay additional amounts of money twice, despite the small print of the 'no sale no fee' promise.