This system is in place to secure the transactions between landowners and land buyers, so it is basically the transition of ownership from one person to another.
In buying and selling conveyancing processes there are two main steps being the transfer of contract and completion and then of course the three main points through out include before contract, before completion and after completion.
The system in the UK and Wales
In England this process is normally carried out by a qualified conveyancer or solicitor, if not one would be there to supervise the process as an unqualified conveyancer carries out the transaction.
Under English and Welsh law it states that the agreements are not legally binding until the contracts are exchanged. This has advantages in the way you have a lot of freedom before the contracts are handed over but also has disadvantages because of the amount of time that would have been wasted if the deal does not follow through in the end is a lot.
The standard practice is for the buyer to agree a certain price with the seller then the buyer would arrange a survey to be carried out on the property. The buyer’s solicitor would then arrange all the pre-contract checks they would need to carry out.
When these checks have been done the buyer’s solicitor or conveyancer will draw up an initial contract agreement that will then be passed to the seller’s solicitor for approval.
The average time period for a conveyancing process to be completed is around 10 – 12 weeks, although this can vary taking either a lot less or more time. The time scale is affected by many different factors including organization of both parties, the initial contract and the results of the survey carried out on the house.
The process in Scotland
In Scotland the process is handled a lot quicker and it is from the initial acceptance of the offer that is legally binding. Also the survey must be carried out before they can even place an offer on the property.
When there is competing interest for a property the seller needs to set a closing date for initial offers on the property. Once the closing date has passed if there is still competing interest then there would be a number of letters sent from both the seller’s solicitor and the buyer’s solicitor to agree on different factors in the final contract. Once all the terms of the contract have been agreed by both sides then there is a merging of the contract and this forms the final standing contract.
Due to the contract being binding at such an early stage there is a lot less chance of the sale falling through at the last minute. The only down side being that there is the chance that they will pay the fees for a survey to be carried out on unsuccessful bids. Although this problem may soon be solved also because they may soon be making sellers provide a survey for all buyers to view when they put their house on the market.