When selling or buying a home, hiring a conveyancer is a good idea to deal with the legal side of transferring property. But, what are the costs involved with conveyancing? We are going to go through the legal fees and disbursements that are involved and what service you will get for the fees you pay.
What are conveyancing fees?
Conveyancing fees are what you are charged by your conveyancer for the service they offer you. Your conveyancer will deal with the legal aspects of selling and buying a home. They do a range of tasks for you during the process such as, checking paperwork, preparing contracts and transferring ownership of a home. If you would like to read more about the timeline of conveyancing for both a seller and buyer you can read our blog post here.
Furthermore, conveyancing fees are paid by both the seller and buyer and are usually between £400 and £1500. However, they can vary depending on a range of factors such as, which conveyancer you choose, where the property is located, the price of the property and how complex the service is you need.
Conveyancing costs
With conveyancing costs you will usually find there are the legal fees and then the disbursements. The legal fees are what your conveyancer will charge you for the service they do for you and the disbursements are what your conveyancer will pay third parties for things like stamp duty and searches.
Legal fees:
The amount you will pay in legal fees can vary but they are usually around £850 to £1000.
Disbursements:
Disbursements differ depending on if you are a buyer or seller. We are going to go through the disbursements you may need to pay for below.
Stamp duty tax
If you are a buyer then you may have to pay stamp duty. On the 23rd September 2022 stamp duty rules changed. If your home is worth more than £250,000 you will need to pay stamp duty however, there are some exemptions. For example, if you are a first time buyer you won’t need to pay stamp duty on the first £425,000 of your home. We cover everything you need to know abut stamp duty in our blog post “A guide to stamp duty after September 2022”.
Land registry
To transfer ownership of the home a fee will need to be paid to the Land registry. The cost of transferring ownership is usually around £200-£300.
Searches
When you are buying a home your conveyancer will do searches for you. A lot of conveyancers will offer you a package which will include all the searches you need doing. This will usually cost between £250 and £450. The three main searches are:
Local authority searches:
First, is the local authority searches to find out information about the property and the area it is in. The search will look at if planning permission was ever granted or rejected, pollution issues, highway issues and building control issues.
Water and drainage searches:
Next, is water and drainage searches, which look at if the home has a water supply and sewer connected to it, if the water supply is metered or rateable and who provides and maintains the drains, sewers and piping.
Environmental searches:
Lastly, is environmental searches to check if there will be any potential problems such as, flooding, subsidence issues, landslides or contaminated land issues.
ID/ anti-money laundering check
Whether you are a seller or buyer your conveyancer will carry out this check to confirm your identity. In addition, if you are a buyer this check is also to ensure the money used for the sale is legal. The cost of this check is around £5 to £20.
Title deeds
You will need to get a copy of your title deeds if you are selling your home. You can get this from the Land Registry and it will cost you between £6-£8.
Bank transfer fees
Another fee there might be is a bank transfer one, this will usually cost between £20 and £50.
Bankruptcy search
This search is mainly for your mortgage lender to make sure you have never been made bankrupt. This will usually cost around £4-£6.
What services you will receive
This is a list of what you will get from your conveyancer for the costs you pay.
- The conveyancer will be there throughout to advise you with anything and answer any questions.
- They will draft the contracts and deal with exchanging them.
- Deal with any paperwork.
- Arrange searches.
- Work with the mortgage lender to make sure they have proof of a mortgage offer and that the mortgage is applied for.
- Handle the transfer of funds
- They will keep the sale on track.
- Handle your completion date.
Summary
To summarise, there are a few costs involved with conveyancing but they are all important in order to make the sale legally binding and for ownership to be transferred. In addition, when choosing your conveyancer be sure to ask about all fees and charges upfront so you can budget accurately for the cost of conveyancing. If you are looking to hire a conveyancer we cover in our blog post everything you need to know before choosing one.
