House purchase legal fees?

[Droflove]

Hi can you tell me what your solicitor charged you when you were buying your house? I just want to see what is the norm for this fee as our solicitor seems to be taking the piss a bit....

We have just been charged £1600, plus stamp duty.

£1370.

My solicitor is expensive but I trust him completely having used him several times before and that's worth paying extra in my book.

it is done on a percentage. Price is no guarantee of quality, some expensive ones will do nothing, some cheaper ones will be very efficient. Some very cheap ones will do nothing.

recommendation is all!

I paid about £600 on a £610k sale, plus disbursements, stamp duty etc etc. Solicitor was efficient, contactable, organised and helpful.

£600?

Surely stamp duty alone is a lot more than that?

yes. That's why I said 'plus disbursements, stamp duty, etc'.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. House is 360k, not London. Solicitor wants 2k. We were shocked and disappointed as we and our family have given him a lot of work on property over the years so only went to him out of loyalty. He was also supposed to give us a good price as we paid heavily on our last house sale with him. Everything has been straightforward except for the addition of a couple of clauses to contract. On top of that he has really not tried to move things along for us and its been 6 weeks and im 38 weeks pregnant. it's very difficult for us to get upset with him and argue the cost for a variety of reasons and we really don't have much money so feel pretty taken advantage of to be honest. I guess we suck it up this time. Hope he doesn't follow mumsnet.

2k is a lot. I bought a house for £325k and paid about £1300.

Mine is 2,600 for sale and purchase. We are using a big local firm and are getting excellent service.

you should have got a fixed price before starting with him. Many 'old family solicitors' do seem to take the piss on pricing.

acceptable turnround time is same day, with efficient deputising for holidays or absences. Anything less is no good.

if it is all nearly done, you probably have to suck it up. Otherwise, sack him and find someone that does some work.

I personally would have gotten quotes and am very careful with money, this is the first thing I think I'm overpaying for in my recollection but my hubby is reliant on work from him so he has us a bit over a barrel.

Our recent sale & purchase cost about £2k - £850 for the sale & £1295 for the purchase. We had an excellent service from a small firm of solicitors. I am in Yorkshire but my solicitors are in Cumbria (family friend/ recommendation)

Is it just a purchase (ie not a sale as well) of a 360k house outside london? If so I think 2k is massively overcharging you. I think you should ask why it is this much.

Have you asked for a break down of what is actually attributable to the legal work, as a lot of the time quotes include property searches which vary between areas. A full search pack on a residential property can be up to 500 and local searches vary from between 75 and 200 depending on the council.

Also Specialsubject would be getting it cheaper because as I understand her post it was just a sale. A purchase is more work for the solicitor as it includes searches, due diligence etc.

Does that include searches etc as well? Or is it just his fees.

oh yes, that's right: £500 for a sale, then about the same for a purchase. I did it in two halves with 5 months rental in between. Plus all the disbursements.

I have mentioned elsewhere that going from a 600k house to a 300k one cost about 20k, including agents fee, stamp duty, legal costs, removals, survey, searches, land reg fee and everything else. NOT including rental and storage!

Its just a purchase and includes searches I believe. But not 3 other things that he said would be 150 on top. Cant remember what they were as I was still reeling about his 2k bombshell.

£790 but house price is only £60,000

We paid £1000 on a £1.2m sale and £250 on a £125k purchase earlier this year.

It isnt always done as a percentage. Lots of solicitors charge a fixed fee. I would shop around and check exactly what it includes (eg disbursements / VAT etc)

It isnt always done as a percentage. Lots of solicitors charge a fixed fee. I would shop around and check exactly what it includes (eg disbursements / VAT etc)

It isnt always done as a percentage. Lots of solicitors charge a fixed fee. I would shop around and check exactly what it includes (eg disbursements / VAT etc)

You should have been given a quote in writing detailing costs and disbursements and exactly what is included.

Sometimes additional costs which are not necessarily forseeable do arise - eg indemnity insurance for a problem which hadn't been highlighted, enfranchisement etc, but you have said that it is straightforward.

Does the £2000 you mentioned include Stamp Duty, land registry fees and so on?

Is there a mortgage which is being charged for separately ?- some banks require a buyer to pay their costs, which would then be included into the the buyers overall legal bill.

As far as I can recall, if the solicitors costs element is not in writing then they can't enforce payment of it.

Best thing would be to speak to the solicitor and say that the costs are more than anticipated and can they explain it to you.

The £150 would be made up of Land Registry fee for registering the purchase, probably a chaps fee for sending out the completion monies and a pre-completion search at the Land Registry. So if the £2000 is inc VAT and includes 500-750 disbursements, a fee of £1000 plus VAT isn't that excessive imho.

Mortgage is all separate, and stamp duty is not included. The £2000 is ex VAT! So thanks all for your responses, it confirms im not being unreasonable to feel taken advantage of. We will have to stick it out with him but I am glad to be clear on the situation.