solicitor suggests to take out no-search indemnity insurance

[Limilimin]

Hi all,
It would be great if anyone can give me any advice on our current situation.
We are in the process of purchasing a property, aiming to finish before the stamp duty holiday.
My solicitor got back to me this morning with news that the local search is not going to be back until late July which is not ideal.
He said to take out no-search indemnity insurance instead as the risk is nigible.

I have no idea what sort of risk there will be and if this insurance will cover all the risk, etc.

If we sell this property in future, would it cause an issue? etc.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Your solicitor should advise you on the risks- ask again if they’re not clear.

Future buyers will do their own searches at the time.

We did this to speed the whole process along as searches were going to delay exchange by a month. Still had the searches and nothing came of them. But this allowed us to exchange on time.

So how does it work? Say you exchange or complete then the search comes back saying the land is on previously contaminated land, or whatever, or that the council has approval for a mobile phone mast in your garden/outside your front door. What does the insurance cover you for?

Sounds reasonable to me, assuming you will have had the other searches (environmental/contaminated land etc) back.

You can find out a fair amount by looking up the local plan for the area and planning applications /permissions for the area - these will all be on the local authority's website

You can check flood risk on the Environment Agency website, I think.
As a pp said, trawl through the planning department website for applications in your postcode.

I would want to know about contaminated land and so forth.

Thanks all for your replies. We've done the environmental/contaminated land/flood risk search which came back as "not identified" so I guess only issue is planning applications/permissions for the area. Thanks.

@Limilimin

Thanks all for your replies. We've done the environmental/contaminated land/flood risk search which came back as "not identified" so I guess only issue is planning applications/permissions for the area. Thanks.

You can check the planning portal? That is really easy to do (and free).

You can commission a Personal Search which would speed it up.

Are you getting a mortgage?

Most mortgage lenders won’t accept these indemnities I’m afraid because they want to see the search results and any issues that might throw up.

The delays are hugely frustrating I agree.

@Youngatheart00
Thanks for your post. Our solicitor confirmed the lender will accept it. so I believe it should be okay.

Oh, that’s surprising (and good work if it all works out!)

Are you at a fairly low LTV%?

OP, did you do this? Was all okay? We may go down same route. Trying to find out more info

(On hold to solicitor currently)