Buying a flat!

[Hitchington]

I am in the process of buying a nice little (bijou!) flat in Peckham. I thought about buying a boat and living the life of a water gypsy on the canal but after much consideration have decided against. So I've found a flat I really like and I have had the housing association (the vendor) accept my suitability as a buyer and now I need to appoint a solicitor for conveyancing and a financial advisor for getting me a mortgage. The agent acting on behalf of the HA has recommended me a solicitor and FA but I'm thinking about shopping around to get a better deal. The solicitors recommended to me have a proven record with shared ownership purchases but I think their fee is a little high. I'm a member of a union and their recommended solicitors charge less than half the other's fee but no have testament to shared ownership deals on their website. It's a similar story with the FAs.

Any advice? Has anyone else had experience with shared ownership, good and bad? Should I go with the agent's recommendations? ? Many thanks!

P.S. I'm actually feeling quite anxious (and excited) about the whole thing, but I guess this is natural.

 

[smokeysmoo]

A flat? In Peckham? It's HERE isn't it Hitch?

Sorry H couldn't resist, (must try harder).

I don't know the first thing about legal shenanigans TBH, but I do hope you get fixed up with no hassles.

If nothing else you've got a free bump from my facetiousness

 

[Sandra6]

Finding a good solicitor isn't the same as finding the cheapest one. We went on personal recommendations when we were buying, they were somewhere in the middle in terms of fees, but did a good job as the sale wasn't straight forward thanks to the shenanigans of the vendor.
I wouldn't use a financial advisor to find a mortgage though. Go online and use the calculators on different websites or go compare or similar and find a good deal for yourself.

 

[Over The Hill]

Hi, in the real world this is what I do.

The agent is probably on a comission deal with whoever he is recommending. It is not unusual for £100 to change hands for every matter passed in the direction of the conveyancer.
A union recommended solicitor; that is a new one on me but I am guessing they may be more suitable for employment disputes rather than property.
You do need a person in a firm who knows their way around shared ownership, and you will get a better price from a firm who are used to dealing with this HA as the lease will be in a standard format that they know.
I would phone up the HA legal department and ask who often acts for the buyers. Also some HA actually have a list of firms (perhaps on thier website) that they recommend or sometimes even you have to use.

Generally with a shared ownership, the whole process is set out by the HA and the buyers solicitors really just have to follow the process. You should make sure you are clear on the key points-
Overall cost of rent and maintenance charges.
Options for buying a further share
Costs and process when you come to sell.

Legal fees I would guess at around £750 plus vat for acting for the buyer. Depending on price.

Re shared ownership, generally they do seem a great way to get into ownership. I have not known anyone regret it.

The FA is another point. Perhaps look at some lenders direct yourself.

Good luck
PM me if you want me to act!

 

[ASC1951]

The agent is probably on a comission deal with whoever he is recommending. It is not unusual for £100 to change hands for every matter passed in the direction of the conveyancer.
A union recommended solicitor; that is a new one on me but I am guessing they may be more suitable for employment disputes rather than property.

If the solicitors are paying commission to the agent, they have to tell you that in writing along with their confirmation of instructions and proposed charges.
'Union recommended' may simply mean that they give a discount to members of that union, rather than being associated with them in any other way or specialising in employment work. My firm used to give discounts to Unison members because we were close to the General Hospital.

Whoever you go to, make sure the individual has done Shared Ownership Purchases before - and not just one or two. Do expect to pay more than for a normal leasehold purchase, because HA procedures are bureaucratic and numbingly slow. It genuinely is a fair bit more work. We would have been quite a lot cheaper than £750 + vat, but fees are lower in Yorkshire, along with rents, wages and most other costs.

And please don't give the job to some conveyancing shed in Liverpool/Croydon/wherever, who promise to deploy their state of the art software and save you hundreds of pounds. The work will be done by some semi-trained gibbon dealing with 300 transactions at once, your only contact will be by phone and it won't actually be any cheaper. They can deal - just about - with routine stuff but shared ownerships will have them wading in porridge.

 

[Hitchington]

Thanks, some sound advice for me to consider

 

[swee'pea99]

You say "I am in the process", but then go on to talk about shared ownership. I'm a bit baffled. If it is you (singular) who's buying this, then I would've thought it was a relatively straightforward transaction, plus you have the bonus of a HA on the other side of the deal, who you can assume will probably be relatively honest, straight-dealing and efficient about the whole business (with a private vendor you never know what you're going to get, either morally or in terms of competence). If that is the case, my inclination would be to go with the union solicitor - conveyancing is not rocket science, they should be able to handle it with no problems, and the union connection suggests to me at least that they're likely to be relatively ethical in their dealings (again, pick a solicitor at random and you have no real idea what you're going to get).

As for the mortgage, absolutely don't waste money on a FA. Use Moneysupermarket and/or similar to find your best deal. That really is simple stuff.

 

[Profpointy]

I am in the process of buying a nice little (bijou!) flat in Peckham. I thought about buying a boat and living the life of a water gypsy on the canal but after much consideration have decided against. So I've found a flat I really like and I have had the housing association (the vendor) accept my suitability as a buyer and now I need to appoint a solicitor for conveyancing and a financial advisor for getting me a mortgage. The agent acting on behalf of the HA has recommended me a solicitor and FA but I'm thinking about shopping around to get a better deal. The solicitors recommended to me have a proven record with shared ownership purchases but I think their fee is a little high. I'm a member of a union and their recommended solicitors charge less than half the other's fee but no have testament to shared ownership deals on their website. It's a similar story with the FAs.

Any advice? Has anyone else had experience with shared ownership, good and bad? Should I go with the agent's recommendations? ? Many thanks!

P.S. I'm actually feeling quite anxious (and excited) about the whole thing, but I guess this is natural.

Go for personal recommendation. I did, and my solicitor told me (a lot) more about my flat than my surveyor (the later recommended by the building society) despite not having visitied the flat. I'm not sure the surveyor had visitied the flat either - but that's another story....