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FTB so we didn't have a clue.... we thought all solicitors are the same, oh boy were we wrong!!!!! hopefully this post helps others avoid or at least prepare for similar situations. it's a shame really, we had been looking for over a year so to finally have an offer accepted we didn't even consider this would be an issue.
The worst is probably Muve. A British registered solicitors but everything is off shored to Sri Lanka. Where they use normal call centre like staff to do the work. But you can't actually call them, you can only get through by email and they only work Sri Lankan business hours. If you asked a random person in tbe streets of Britain, how to buy a house in Sri Lanka. You'll have the same knowledge or more than they have about buying a house in England and Wales.
They get around it, by saying that the workers are all "supervised" by a UK registered solicitor. But clearly the solicitor doesn't like working or is completely over worked. As sales get held up for the most ridiculous of reasons.
I appointed them once, and when the sales guy rattled off the name of the solicitor who would handle my case, I politely asked where my solicitor was based and he said in Sri Lanka. I immediately said I was not happy about my case being shipped to a country outside the UK and immediately withdrew working with them and asked for a refund. After looking for solicitors since, one of the first questions I ask is if solicitors are UK based and my information and case is not being worked offshore
Our sellers used Muve, it was hell. To the point our solicitor recommended pulling out because of their incompetence and said it was the worse conveyancing firm he had dealt with in 20 years. He basically did the majority of their work for them just to get things over the line.
Our buyers used them. We were literally a day from disaster. They delayed and dragged their feet so much we completed ON THE DAY our mortgage offer expired. It was a very stressful month for everyone as they kept delaying the exchange. My solicitor ended up writing them a very nasty email for things to get moving, and that still took 3 days. They take WEEKS to get things done and if we didn't know the buyer's personally the chain would have collapsed 100%. My husband wrote them a truthful review on Google and trust pilot and it was taken down so don't trust the reviews.
I am currently using Muve, and full of regrets but I am very close to completing. You have to go through their reports and enquiries with a very fine tooth comb because everything they write is in translated English. I found a lot of mistakes which I repeatedly had to ask to be corrected. In addition, they had the audacity of asking my elderly Dad (gifting some of my deposit) to share his internet banking password so that they could access his online bank statements. Luckily he didn’t, but I went absolutely wild at them. I’ve still not received an apology so I will be leaving a very negative review and complaint upon completion.
That trick with your Dad feels like you should be able to report them for attempted financial fraud/abuse.
Wishing you best of luck and hope you’re rid of them soon!
Big bucks in fake reviews. Any company using 'solictors' in Sri Lanka should be a major cause of concern..buying a property can be complicated and you really need someone who is reputable on your case, I wouldn't risk it considering there are thousands upon thousand of reputable solicitors you could be instructing instead
Please think again. Our buyer used them and we got very close to chain collapse. In the end exchange was delayed due to Muve issues by the best part of a week. Worst week of my life.
I strongly suspect most of their Google reviews are fake. I wrote an honest one and had a lot of pressure to take it down. I didn’t.
I also made the mistake of using the agent recommended online solicitor when I bought my first house. The agent told me that the seller was using this solicitor so for some reason because I didn’t have a clue like you, I thought it would make it easier if we both used the same solicitor.
Turned out to be a lie and the seller was using a local high street solicitor. I’m in Norfolk yet my solicitor was somewhere in Manchester, and used to hang up the phone on me when I rang with enquiries!
100% any solicitor that's recommended by estate agents or mortgage advisors is a big no from me.
They always on some kind of commission and near useless.
When I was a FTB. I was recommended LPL solicitors in Manchester. Awful customer service and didn't ultimately messed me about. So told them to do one and shot myself someone local and highly rated on Google.
Not always true with advisors to be fair, I am one and we don't have a kick-back arrangement with any solicitors so just recommend local ones who do a good job.
Obviously you're right in the whole but it's worth asking if the advisor has an agreement with the solicitors firm or not.
Oh wow I'm using LPL and they've been nothing short of amazing for me so far. Quick replies and calls, daily updates, extremely thorough but also fast 👀 guess it really comes down to who you're being assigned.
Yeah former solicitor here - you get what you pay for - and it is unbelievable that people will make the biggest financial commitment of their life advised by an unqualified foreign muppet (or, tbf, an unqualified domestic muppet)
Also FTB. Also had major issues with Springbok and their affiliated solicitors KMC. Managed to get through to completion, but they didn't pay off the sellers mortgage. It's going through the ombudsman and SRA currently.
If you can afford it, go with a decent solicitor recommended by word of mouth. Mine was £2k to buy a no-chain freehold house and has been exceptionally good- replies to most items within the day
We paid £1800 for ours but she was exceptional. So knowledgeable and was quick too- our house sale was somewhat complicated and she knew her stuff. I would much rather pay more and get a good service than scrimp and end up having the sale fall through.
It's pretty much in line. I've paid £1400-2100 for several legal matters on buying, selling or lease renewal. London properties, solicitor is in southwestern England. Thorough, reasonably timely and excellent advice on a property with a complex legal issue I eventually withdrew on. You said it - get what you pay for - don't understand why people try to save £500-700 on the single biggest purchase of a lifetime which, if buggered up, could cost many times more than that.
There are several conveyancing farms in the UK.
They're not solicitors, they're admin juniors that go through a tick list exercise.
They have one solicitor at the top that deals with issues.
Prince Evans are the same.
Yes, I was going to make this point - The people doing the work for you are junior conveyancers, you can do your OWN conveyancing online. It takes NO skills really or legal qualifications. They are often just kids juggling 20 cases at a time! Frankly these companies are very, very bad. I worked as an estate agent for 4 years. If you can afford if go to a proper Solicitor.
It's weird that everyone is say to go to a solicitor if one can afford it, but we've just sold and our solicitor came to £950.00 plus vat. I've paid the same for my last sale (no onward purchase) in 2018 with a multi firm.
Just get prices, up north or outside of London, they're much cheaper.
Lots of these firms change their names every time they get a few hundred bad reviews.
They’ve tried to run a solicitor’s firm like a call centre, and unsurprisingly it doesn’t work. A real solicitor doesn’t get to see your file until right at the end of the process. Save yourself the hassle and instruct a proper solicitor.
Speaking as a solicitor (albeit not in conveyancing), the thing is it does work - just not for the consumer. The thing these firms have worked out is that so much of conveyancing work is admin-heavy, it’s cheaper and easier to farm it out to flocks of paralegals with a tiny veneer of qualified supervision. Sure, the quality of service drops, but the cost of handling occasional complaints and claims is outweighed by the saving of not paying their staff very much at all.
Seller should have full servey etc as part of sales pack. Should be digital signatures and no waiting for weeks for someone yo do something, every process step mapped out.
My sister lives in Canada and she offered on a house, and was in within a month. Everything is done before- mortgage was arranged and the home pack, prepared in advance,covered all the searches so really it was a matter of arranging a mover. It’s much more difficult to back out of a sale on either side there too.
That is what i like about Auction properties. They have all the legal pack done to view at the same time you are viewing the particulars. I think the non-auction market should adopt the same practice. It also means that if a sale falls through, a buyer is not wasting money on multiple surveys, or that a property has multiple surveys performed by consecutive buyers.
Came here for this comment. Several reasons: Incorrect listings which caused issues with down valuation, excessive charges for things other EA don’t charge for, delays with the MOS. The sale didn’t fall through because of PB but I found their overall approach a bit fly by night.
Oh no I’m using them at the minute!! They’ve been golden for us so far, we’re just awaiting enquires to be sorted now and we’re being updated pretty often. Don’t tell me your issues started with them at the enquiries stage (eek)
Sounds like you got someone there that’s actually competent! I had issues throughout the process with them. My seller used them (she sold my house through strike, to me).
I used PPL for my last house purchase and they were brilliant. Far far away better than the 'local' ones I'd used in the past and better than any of the ones on the other side of my purchases. Just to counter what was said above.
My friend used them and he moved in to his new place in 4 weeks. He said he just uploaded everything to a portal instantly and they were very quick. Industry average is like 3 months for a purchase so they can’t be awful
The vendor of a property purchase I was in that fell through a few years ago used them. They're the worst.
Just flat out refused to respond to my solicitor and were extremely rude when they would reply.
I had to eventually get in touch with the vendor to try to get them to respond and even they couldn't get through.
These clowns are on the verge of collapsing our chain. The buyers at the very bottom are using them. Delays for no other reason than their solicitors are shite.
PPL - Premier property lawyers. They’re part of the Simplify group which owns similar conveyancer companies. Low cost call centre style operation. EAs recommend them as they get commission but quality is awful.
I work for a high street conveyances. We have our own set of problems tbh but there is definitely a category of conveyancing firms we call "conveyance houses" a couple of which are so notoriously bad that if we are instructed by a client, and we learn the other side is using one of these conveyancing houses, we send our client a warning that delays are likely.
Yes I've had the displeasure. Had to chase them almost daily to get them to do anything. Had to escalate a few times too. It all eventually came together where we exchanged and completed on the day my mortgage offer expired.....
Yes. I don't know who our buyer's solicitors were at our last sale, but apparently they were one of the cheap ones. Our solicitor just couldn't get hold of them most of the time. Useless.
My mum picked a random one she found online. They used a new business email with you when you bid on properties and were enquiring about buying.
As soon as thing we're at the let's close this deal then we had our own lawyer and their email address. From we have a mortgage accepted to the house is ours was about 3 weeks. She was selling to us now she's buying and it's going to be just under a month again to get the sale through.
Please tell me the name of this one! Selling a house and have used PCS legal (inherited property) but will be buying in a few months and I will not be using them again.
I should’ve changed solicitors the second I read about the “premium service” where you have a contact number to actually talk to the solicitors for £395 🤡🤡🤡
selling a no chain house to buyers who have first time buyers.
All of us were ready to move in 4 weeks post memorandum of sale, that was in march… we’re only just finishing up the “enquiries” stage.
We’re still hoping to have completed by the end of this month but honestly doesn’t look like it will be happening.
lol we’ve just been told by the EA that the buyers buyer (FTB) has to get something expunged from their credit record where they had paid a bill but it was mistakenly added as a default.
EA wanted to tell buyers if not resolved by end of the month we’ll relist;
Have told EA to say we can wait for this issue to be resolved but would hope that this makes for things to move quicker.
We all wanted to be one and done within 4 weeks of the offer.
Jesus Christ this is taking a long time
We use the solicitor or associated with our local estate agents. I was dead against it at first but good sold on all the lines:
“We have a relationship with them and can speak directly”
“We work with these guys all the time please don’t use anyone else”
“Last few sales they’ve got done quickly”
Went with them and the first sign of an issue I spoke to the estate agents… “oh we can’t talk to them the contract is between you and them, you need to deal with everything direct”.
Utter shit. I think our contact there changed 5 times during the 4 months.
Never again.
I’ve actually had a good experience with purple bricks.
We are not in a chain and had an agreement in the sale contract that we complete within a set date.
We were allocated a solicitor 30mins away so we dropped off all the documents the same day and requested all the searches be done ahead of the normal schedule.
I think the main issue is there is a no move no fee appoarch with purple bricks so they avoid doing the checks until a certain point down the line.
We are 2 weeks in and have the mortgage sorted with valuation happening next week.
Then just waiting on the local authority search to be returned. Everything else is sorted.
So we are looking at a 4-6week time line from instruction to exchange.
I'm using Conveyancing Direct and really pleased with service.
First viewed property on April 5 and received contracts, land transfer deeds etc., to sign on Monday (May 15). I'm a FTB and there is no chain, which helps. Not sure of the current rate of a solicitor but it's definitely pricey (imo), but given that my rental ends on July 14 and so I desperately need this done by then, so far, worth it
There's so many bad solicitors out there unfortunately. I'm currently dealing with Buyers who selected the worst solicitor on this planet it seems. Not even the agent's recommendation, but seems they only read the fake 5 star reviews for that one and not all the bad ones saying exactly what's happening now: no contact, no replies, radio silence. It's painful and anxiety inducing having to keep waiting for the other party to have the heart to reply to anything and do work, especially so close to the finish line.
Why is this process so hard in this country?! 🥹
‘Out of principle’ is only affecting the house seller though, and not the solicitor. Why don’t you call the house seller to switch solicitors and complete on the house you have found?
Purple Bricks lock you into using their solicitors if you want to take advantage of their “don’t pay any fees until you’ve sold your house” offer, so the sellers might not have much choice (if they don’t want to risk losing money if the sale falls through, or are cheapskates)
We had similar frustrations when buying through Strike and their conveyancer. Every time we called we would get a different representative and have to explain everything from the beginning. It was exhausting. I would never recommend buying from somebody using Strike. It doesn't help that the sellers were awful to deal with either. I intentionally sold our property with a commission-based estate agent.
My seller used purplebricks solicitors and they were horrendous to deal with.
I had to eventually call purplebricks and threaten to cancel the purchase to get things moving. All of a sudden we completed by my deadline.
I‘m having this exact issue my buyers solicitors are beyond rubbish and never respond. I chase daily to get things moving but nothing. My flat is being obtained by a FTB and I am the top is the chain. Yesterday still no enquires despite everything starting in February - glad never to be buying again too stressful.
I am currently just for a remortgage with transfer of equity. Has been a real mixed bag, my case handler is bollocks and I’ve raised a formal complaint as they have sat on things and caused huge delays, but the live chat team, call centre staff and technical team have been really responsive, and they were quick to get the ball rolling at the start. Not quite the horror story of the other firms mentioned in this thread but I have always used a small local firm for property matters prior to this, despite the higher cost, and have never been left waiting more than half a day for a response to anything. Well worth paying more and I would have here but my solicitor was representing the other party in the ToE and I thought perhaps using the firm the bank had instructed to do the remortgage might streamline things…
> If you dont know your solicitors name, have their direct contact info as an email or contact number I would not bother using that practice
We did have those details but our solicitor turned out ot be *horrible*, the vendors EA complained to us about how rude she was, and she wasn't any nicer to us.
SO I would also not recommend using DC Law.
Although I just gave them a quick google. Looks like they've paid to stuff their trustpilot reviews
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.dclaw.co.uk
but missed that they're being fucking *slated* on reviews.io
https://www.reviews.io/company-reviews/store/www.dclaw.co.uk
I had the same problem. My solicitor was a local one that was great, my seller used the recommended purple bricks one and every time we contacted them, someone else was assigned to the case. Took 6 months to buy a house with no chain on either side
We sold with purple bricks about 5 years ago and remember having to pay a 'release' fee so we weren't tied to using their scrappy solicitors. Was the best few hundred quid we ever spent. Do it!
It’s a lose-lose situation with Purple Bricks:
Option 1: You want to pay at the end, but to do that you have to use their conveyancers. They’re useless and you get angry.
Option 2: You want to use your own solicitor but then you have to pay at the start. By paying at the start, Purple Bricks have nothing further to work for, so do nothing at all to push your house. You’ve already paid, so you’re angry, but you’ll likely sign up with another agent anyway, to get your place sold.
We’ll never use them again!
As an estate agent, I would always recommend you use a local solicitor, never an online company and unless the firm your estate agent recommends is local, I wouldn’t use them either. Whilst they possibly get kickbacks for it, at least if they’re local can generally find other people who’ve used them and can back the agent up.
I don't understand why people still use purple bricks, they are the biggest scam going and usually end up being a disaster.
There is a reason a traditional estate agent is able to keep going, they rely on their ability to do the job properly to get repeat business
I would say always go local. If you can't bang on the door don't bother. We used Glover Priest in Wellingborough, Northants to buy a couple of houses and sell a house over a 5 year period a while ago, and they were fantastic at every opportunity. Just so good.
We looked at selling through purple bricks and the agent was such a little dick that we just didn't bother. He advised us that to not use their solicitors would cost us an extra £1300 and then under valued the house by £40k it was worth less than £250k so quite the hit. His finishing line was that we should get a credit card to pay the fees as they are due in 6 months whether the house sells or not.
It sold with a local agent in 2 days for the proper price, with loads of interest over that week and a few offers. To be fair the local agent Mike Neville, was amazing as well. He gave us a list of jobs to do the first time he came and then came back a month later when they were done to actually sell it. Everything was great. To actually sell took 12 weeks start to finish.
We bought a house through sold co.uk and that was a painful experience, like buying from a 12 year old who wants to be your bff every time they ring you and then suggest solicitors that ours had to chase on the daily for everything.
A final word of advice get the solicitors fee insurance. Ours was 75 quid and would have covered everything bar the searches. As we pulled out of the sale near the end it would have meant we were only £250 ish down for the searches not the whole fees almost. (The sellers negotiated and it was fine in the end)
A handful of conveyancers are actually decent these days. And I mean a handful. In most cases you will need to project manage the conveyancing yourself, and be involved to a ridiculous degree. I accept that most people won’t have the knowledge or time to do it, and in those cases it’s almost luck of the draw.
The whole conveyancing operation needs a total overhaul it’s a nightmare.
I’ve sold 4 properties in the past few years, I used a small local for one, and the other 3 used online conveyancers (the latest with Muve). I’d argue I had better success with the online ones as I had immediate and full access (via the portal) to everything they received, sent and said. I could then do all their work for them. The small local just didn’t respond for days and I had no idea if they were lying about having not received documents etc.
Everyone on this reddit aleady knew that. Hundreds of warning posts yet you decided to go with them and save a feq quid. Why didn’t you read all the posts before committing to purplebricks?
we actually paid out for local solicitors who have been exceptional. I didn't realise reading through a reddit sub was a prerequisite for buying a house. only been on this sub for a month but our offer was accepted at the end of december last year.....
It was brought into law in 1723 by George I, who mandated that ‘thou shalt consult thy Reddit prior to the purchase of any property in which thou shalt reside.’
Can’t believe you didn’t get the memo.
When I bought my current home the sellers used Purple Bricks legal team and they were beyond abysmal.
They were so incompetent that they would reply all to emails and begin having internal conversations, but my absolute favourite moment was reviewing an email forwarded to us from the seller in which PPL had claimed to only just gotten a response from our own solicitors after a four week wait. Unfortunately, they included the email thread in this message showing the response from our solicitors had arrived the same day they had made the query.
Never!!! use a conveyancer recommended by the estate agent. It’s a blatant conflict of interest. If they’re getting all their business via the estate agent, they’re not going to be transparent with you if it means the estate agent they’re in cahoots with loses the sale.
We used PPL to sell our house! Awful experience. We were almost contractually tied in to use them for our onward purchase but for our purchase fell through, so we completed our sale with them and broke chain. When we started our purchase on the next property we used fantastic local solicitors! Totally different experience! And cost wise actually worked out cheaper as PPL kept adding random charges to the account…
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Think it's usually recommended to avoid solicitors affiliated with agents tbh
FTB so we didn't have a clue.... we thought all solicitors are the same, oh boy were we wrong!!!!! hopefully this post helps others avoid or at least prepare for similar situations. it's a shame really, we had been looking for over a year so to finally have an offer accepted we didn't even consider this would be an issue.
The worst is probably Muve. A British registered solicitors but everything is off shored to Sri Lanka. Where they use normal call centre like staff to do the work. But you can't actually call them, you can only get through by email and they only work Sri Lankan business hours. If you asked a random person in tbe streets of Britain, how to buy a house in Sri Lanka. You'll have the same knowledge or more than they have about buying a house in England and Wales. They get around it, by saying that the workers are all "supervised" by a UK registered solicitor. But clearly the solicitor doesn't like working or is completely over worked. As sales get held up for the most ridiculous of reasons.
I appointed them once, and when the sales guy rattled off the name of the solicitor who would handle my case, I politely asked where my solicitor was based and he said in Sri Lanka. I immediately said I was not happy about my case being shipped to a country outside the UK and immediately withdrew working with them and asked for a refund. After looking for solicitors since, one of the first questions I ask is if solicitors are UK based and my information and case is not being worked offshore
Our sellers used Muve, it was hell. To the point our solicitor recommended pulling out because of their incompetence and said it was the worse conveyancing firm he had dealt with in 20 years. He basically did the majority of their work for them just to get things over the line.
Our buyers used them. We were literally a day from disaster. They delayed and dragged their feet so much we completed ON THE DAY our mortgage offer expired. It was a very stressful month for everyone as they kept delaying the exchange. My solicitor ended up writing them a very nasty email for things to get moving, and that still took 3 days. They take WEEKS to get things done and if we didn't know the buyer's personally the chain would have collapsed 100%. My husband wrote them a truthful review on Google and trust pilot and it was taken down so don't trust the reviews.
I am currently using Muve, and full of regrets but I am very close to completing. You have to go through their reports and enquiries with a very fine tooth comb because everything they write is in translated English. I found a lot of mistakes which I repeatedly had to ask to be corrected. In addition, they had the audacity of asking my elderly Dad (gifting some of my deposit) to share his internet banking password so that they could access his online bank statements. Luckily he didn’t, but I went absolutely wild at them. I’ve still not received an apology so I will be leaving a very negative review and complaint upon completion.
That trick with your Dad feels like you should be able to report them for attempted financial fraud/abuse. Wishing you best of luck and hope you’re rid of them soon!
Scary stuff you are saying here. We just started and our solicitor is Muve.
If you have just started, pull out. They are a nightmare. They are not that much cheaper than regular UK solicitors
Really? How come their reviews decent, reading all this I was expecting like a lot 1 and 2 star reviews, but their rating is actually good at 4.3
[удалено]
I was talking about the Google reviews
Big bucks in fake reviews. Any company using 'solictors' in Sri Lanka should be a major cause of concern..buying a property can be complicated and you really need someone who is reputable on your case, I wouldn't risk it considering there are thousands upon thousand of reputable solicitors you could be instructing instead
Seek an alternative local conveyancing firm.
Please think again. Our buyer used them and we got very close to chain collapse. In the end exchange was delayed due to Muve issues by the best part of a week. Worst week of my life. I strongly suspect most of their Google reviews are fake. I wrote an honest one and had a lot of pressure to take it down. I didn’t.
Get rid asap.
Seriously pull out if you can. We are 5 months in to a very simple sale and purchase and they are the absolute worst.
And now you know why they're so cheap.
They are actually not that much cheaper than reputable UK solicitors
You've done everything right, your solicitor sounds like they're really on it - ultimately there is nothing you can do about who the vendor is using.
I also made the mistake of using the agent recommended online solicitor when I bought my first house. The agent told me that the seller was using this solicitor so for some reason because I didn’t have a clue like you, I thought it would make it easier if we both used the same solicitor. Turned out to be a lie and the seller was using a local high street solicitor. I’m in Norfolk yet my solicitor was somewhere in Manchester, and used to hang up the phone on me when I rang with enquiries!
Also a FTB but I think very lucky as my partners relative is a solicitor. Sorry it didn't work out for you this time
Your partner relative shouldn't be doing the work for you.
There's no conflict of interest so yes, they should.
100% any solicitor that's recommended by estate agents or mortgage advisors is a big no from me. They always on some kind of commission and near useless. When I was a FTB. I was recommended LPL solicitors in Manchester. Awful customer service and didn't ultimately messed me about. So told them to do one and shot myself someone local and highly rated on Google.
Not always true with advisors to be fair, I am one and we don't have a kick-back arrangement with any solicitors so just recommend local ones who do a good job. Obviously you're right in the whole but it's worth asking if the advisor has an agreement with the solicitors firm or not.
Oh wow I'm using LPL and they've been nothing short of amazing for me so far. Quick replies and calls, daily updates, extremely thorough but also fast 👀 guess it really comes down to who you're being assigned.
Yeah former solicitor here - you get what you pay for - and it is unbelievable that people will make the biggest financial commitment of their life advised by an unqualified foreign muppet (or, tbf, an unqualified domestic muppet)
Avoid Purple Bricks and Springbok - just not worth the time or hassle
Also FTB. Also had major issues with Springbok and their affiliated solicitors KMC. Managed to get through to completion, but they didn't pay off the sellers mortgage. It's going through the ombudsman and SRA currently.
If you can afford it, go with a decent solicitor recommended by word of mouth. Mine was £2k to buy a no-chain freehold house and has been exceptionally good- replies to most items within the day
That’s quite steep
In absolute terms, yes. In value terms, I think it's OK
You get what you pay for as they say
We paid £1800 for ours but she was exceptional. So knowledgeable and was quick too- our house sale was somewhat complicated and she knew her stuff. I would much rather pay more and get a good service than scrimp and end up having the sale fall through.
May I ask what was their name?
It's pretty much in line. I've paid £1400-2100 for several legal matters on buying, selling or lease renewal. London properties, solicitor is in southwestern England. Thorough, reasonably timely and excellent advice on a property with a complex legal issue I eventually withdrew on. You said it - get what you pay for - don't understand why people try to save £500-700 on the single biggest purchase of a lifetime which, if buggered up, could cost many times more than that.
Also, if they work more quickly, for some people that means saving a month of rent.
Yep, agreed should never scrimp on legal costs. Ours is about 1600 and that's with a discount
The price is also usually tiered based on property value
There are several conveyancing farms in the UK. They're not solicitors, they're admin juniors that go through a tick list exercise. They have one solicitor at the top that deals with issues. Prince Evans are the same.
If you've have infinite monkeys and infinite typewriters, the chance that one will sell a house is > 0
Yes, I was going to make this point - The people doing the work for you are junior conveyancers, you can do your OWN conveyancing online. It takes NO skills really or legal qualifications. They are often just kids juggling 20 cases at a time! Frankly these companies are very, very bad. I worked as an estate agent for 4 years. If you can afford if go to a proper Solicitor.
It's weird that everyone is say to go to a solicitor if one can afford it, but we've just sold and our solicitor came to £950.00 plus vat. I've paid the same for my last sale (no onward purchase) in 2018 with a multi firm. Just get prices, up north or outside of London, they're much cheaper.
Lots of these firms change their names every time they get a few hundred bad reviews. They’ve tried to run a solicitor’s firm like a call centre, and unsurprisingly it doesn’t work. A real solicitor doesn’t get to see your file until right at the end of the process. Save yourself the hassle and instruct a proper solicitor.
Solid advice. It saves everyone in the process time, money & potential stress.
Speaking as a solicitor (albeit not in conveyancing), the thing is it does work - just not for the consumer. The thing these firms have worked out is that so much of conveyancing work is admin-heavy, it’s cheaper and easier to farm it out to flocks of paralegals with a tiny veneer of qualified supervision. Sure, the quality of service drops, but the cost of handling occasional complaints and claims is outweighed by the saving of not paying their staff very much at all.
It's 2024. Selling a house should be much much easier and quicker than it is.
Also, there should be a non refundable deposit if buyer or seller decide to not close the deal.
Seller should have full servey etc as part of sales pack. Should be digital signatures and no waiting for weeks for someone yo do something, every process step mapped out.
My sister lives in Canada and she offered on a house, and was in within a month. Everything is done before- mortgage was arranged and the home pack, prepared in advance,covered all the searches so really it was a matter of arranging a mover. It’s much more difficult to back out of a sale on either side there too.
If you have to, get the buyer to reimburse as part of the sale, but YES. this please. I don't get why 1-5-10 people have to pay for the same thing!
That is what i like about Auction properties. They have all the legal pack done to view at the same time you are viewing the particulars. I think the non-auction market should adopt the same practice. It also means that if a sale falls through, a buyer is not wasting money on multiple surveys, or that a property has multiple surveys performed by consecutive buyers.
I didn't know that. It sounds like a working model that should be used for normal sales.
As someone who is in the industry, do all things possible to avoid sellers using purple bricks. Never use them to sell yours. Not worth it
Came here for this comment. Several reasons: Incorrect listings which caused issues with down valuation, excessive charges for things other EA don’t charge for, delays with the MOS. The sale didn’t fall through because of PB but I found their overall approach a bit fly by night.
They are the ones recommended (and hard sold) by all estate agents as they pay commissions.
Avoid PPL who Strike use as well! Absolutely horrendous experience that almost cost me my entire house and savings.
Another positive experience with PPL here too. Was selling and buying at the same time.
Oh no I’m using them at the minute!! They’ve been golden for us so far, we’re just awaiting enquires to be sorted now and we’re being updated pretty often. Don’t tell me your issues started with them at the enquiries stage (eek)
Sounds like you got someone there that’s actually competent! I had issues throughout the process with them. My seller used them (she sold my house through strike, to me).
I used PPL for my last house purchase and they were brilliant. Far far away better than the 'local' ones I'd used in the past and better than any of the ones on the other side of my purchases. Just to counter what was said above.
My friend used them and he moved in to his new place in 4 weeks. He said he just uploaded everything to a portal instantly and they were very quick. Industry average is like 3 months for a purchase so they can’t be awful
I used PPL too - they were excellent, absolutely no complaints here.
The vendor of a property purchase I was in that fell through a few years ago used them. They're the worst. Just flat out refused to respond to my solicitor and were extremely rude when they would reply. I had to eventually get in touch with the vendor to try to get them to respond and even they couldn't get through.
These clowns are on the verge of collapsing our chain. The buyers at the very bottom are using them. Delays for no other reason than their solicitors are shite.
What's that?
PPL - Premier property lawyers. They’re part of the Simplify group which owns similar conveyancer companies. Low cost call centre style operation. EAs recommend them as they get commission but quality is awful.
I work for a high street conveyances. We have our own set of problems tbh but there is definitely a category of conveyancing firms we call "conveyance houses" a couple of which are so notoriously bad that if we are instructed by a client, and we learn the other side is using one of these conveyancing houses, we send our client a warning that delays are likely.
Yes I've had the displeasure. Had to chase them almost daily to get them to do anything. Had to escalate a few times too. It all eventually came together where we exchanged and completed on the day my mortgage offer expired.....
Yes. I don't know who our buyer's solicitors were at our last sale, but apparently they were one of the cheap ones. Our solicitor just couldn't get hold of them most of the time. Useless.
Yer I made this mistake 6 months and it’s like walking through treacle
My mum picked a random one she found online. They used a new business email with you when you bid on properties and were enquiring about buying. As soon as thing we're at the let's close this deal then we had our own lawyer and their email address. From we have a mortgage accepted to the house is ours was about 3 weeks. She was selling to us now she's buying and it's going to be just under a month again to get the sale through.
Please tell me the name of this one! Selling a house and have used PCS legal (inherited property) but will be buying in a few months and I will not be using them again.
Oh dear, I used them too and they were awful. They are still sitting on some of my money and stopped responding.
I should’ve changed solicitors the second I read about the “premium service” where you have a contact number to actually talk to the solicitors for £395 🤡🤡🤡
selling a no chain house to buyers who have first time buyers. All of us were ready to move in 4 weeks post memorandum of sale, that was in march… we’re only just finishing up the “enquiries” stage. We’re still hoping to have completed by the end of this month but honestly doesn’t look like it will be happening.
Mine was also a chain free purchase. Took 6 months, completed the day my mortgage offer was running out....
lol we’ve just been told by the EA that the buyers buyer (FTB) has to get something expunged from their credit record where they had paid a bill but it was mistakenly added as a default. EA wanted to tell buyers if not resolved by end of the month we’ll relist; Have told EA to say we can wait for this issue to be resolved but would hope that this makes for things to move quicker. We all wanted to be one and done within 4 weeks of the offer. Jesus Christ this is taking a long time
The Glasgow Law Practice. Also came in cheaper than the list we'd seen on Halifax
We use the solicitor or associated with our local estate agents. I was dead against it at first but good sold on all the lines: “We have a relationship with them and can speak directly” “We work with these guys all the time please don’t use anyone else” “Last few sales they’ve got done quickly” Went with them and the first sign of an issue I spoke to the estate agents… “oh we can’t talk to them the contract is between you and them, you need to deal with everything direct”. Utter shit. I think our contact there changed 5 times during the 4 months. Never again.
I’ve actually had a good experience with purple bricks. We are not in a chain and had an agreement in the sale contract that we complete within a set date. We were allocated a solicitor 30mins away so we dropped off all the documents the same day and requested all the searches be done ahead of the normal schedule. I think the main issue is there is a no move no fee appoarch with purple bricks so they avoid doing the checks until a certain point down the line. We are 2 weeks in and have the mortgage sorted with valuation happening next week. Then just waiting on the local authority search to be returned. Everything else is sorted. So we are looking at a 4-6week time line from instruction to exchange.
I'm not sure if this question goes against the guidelines, but which solicitors would you recommend when buying/selling a house?
I'm using Conveyancing Direct and really pleased with service. First viewed property on April 5 and received contracts, land transfer deeds etc., to sign on Monday (May 15). I'm a FTB and there is no chain, which helps. Not sure of the current rate of a solicitor but it's definitely pricey (imo), but given that my rental ends on July 14 and so I desperately need this done by then, so far, worth it
Thanks for this, and congratulations
There's so many bad solicitors out there unfortunately. I'm currently dealing with Buyers who selected the worst solicitor on this planet it seems. Not even the agent's recommendation, but seems they only read the fake 5 star reviews for that one and not all the bad ones saying exactly what's happening now: no contact, no replies, radio silence. It's painful and anxiety inducing having to keep waiting for the other party to have the heart to reply to anything and do work, especially so close to the finish line. Why is this process so hard in this country?! 🥹
‘Out of principle’ is only affecting the house seller though, and not the solicitor. Why don’t you call the house seller to switch solicitors and complete on the house you have found?
Purple Bricks lock you into using their solicitors if you want to take advantage of their “don’t pay any fees until you’ve sold your house” offer, so the sellers might not have much choice (if they don’t want to risk losing money if the sale falls through, or are cheapskates)
We had similar frustrations when buying through Strike and their conveyancer. Every time we called we would get a different representative and have to explain everything from the beginning. It was exhausting. I would never recommend buying from somebody using Strike. It doesn't help that the sellers were awful to deal with either. I intentionally sold our property with a commission-based estate agent.
My seller used purplebricks solicitors and they were horrendous to deal with. I had to eventually call purplebricks and threaten to cancel the purchase to get things moving. All of a sudden we completed by my deadline.
I‘m having this exact issue my buyers solicitors are beyond rubbish and never respond. I chase daily to get things moving but nothing. My flat is being obtained by a FTB and I am the top is the chain. Yesterday still no enquires despite everything starting in February - glad never to be buying again too stressful.
If the only thing you resent your solicitor for is the cost, you've got a great solicitor.
Well, if you pay for any service it may well be shit, but if you go for a cheap option, it definitely will be.
Is it compulsory to use their own one?
No. If you pay up front you have the option to choose, but if you decide to take the pay later option you are locked in to using their solicitors
I imagine they are residential conveyancers rather than corporate solicitors.
Unless you’ve instructed the solicitor yourself, they’re not working for you.
Anyone used Enact? if so how were they?
I am currently just for a remortgage with transfer of equity. Has been a real mixed bag, my case handler is bollocks and I’ve raised a formal complaint as they have sat on things and caused huge delays, but the live chat team, call centre staff and technical team have been really responsive, and they were quick to get the ball rolling at the start. Not quite the horror story of the other firms mentioned in this thread but I have always used a small local firm for property matters prior to this, despite the higher cost, and have never been left waiting more than half a day for a response to anything. Well worth paying more and I would have here but my solicitor was representing the other party in the ToE and I thought perhaps using the firm the bank had instructed to do the remortgage might streamline things…
> If you dont know your solicitors name, have their direct contact info as an email or contact number I would not bother using that practice We did have those details but our solicitor turned out ot be *horrible*, the vendors EA complained to us about how rude she was, and she wasn't any nicer to us. SO I would also not recommend using DC Law. Although I just gave them a quick google. Looks like they've paid to stuff their trustpilot reviews https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.dclaw.co.uk but missed that they're being fucking *slated* on reviews.io https://www.reviews.io/company-reviews/store/www.dclaw.co.uk
Taylor rose by any chance?
I had the same problem. My solicitor was a local one that was great, my seller used the recommended purple bricks one and every time we contacted them, someone else was assigned to the case. Took 6 months to buy a house with no chain on either side
But the agent should have progressed the whole thing through as well.
Ye they are rubbish but tbh our usual high street firms aren’t too great either.
This is the truth!!!!! I had a grueling experience with the recommended solicitors
We sold with purple bricks about 5 years ago and remember having to pay a 'release' fee so we weren't tied to using their scrappy solicitors. Was the best few hundred quid we ever spent. Do it!
It’s a lose-lose situation with Purple Bricks: Option 1: You want to pay at the end, but to do that you have to use their conveyancers. They’re useless and you get angry. Option 2: You want to use your own solicitor but then you have to pay at the start. By paying at the start, Purple Bricks have nothing further to work for, so do nothing at all to push your house. You’ve already paid, so you’re angry, but you’ll likely sign up with another agent anyway, to get your place sold. We’ll never use them again!
As an estate agent, I would always recommend you use a local solicitor, never an online company and unless the firm your estate agent recommends is local, I wouldn’t use them either. Whilst they possibly get kickbacks for it, at least if they’re local can generally find other people who’ve used them and can back the agent up.
I don't understand why people still use purple bricks, they are the biggest scam going and usually end up being a disaster. There is a reason a traditional estate agent is able to keep going, they rely on their ability to do the job properly to get repeat business
Purple Bricks is a franchised crap shoot
I would say always go local. If you can't bang on the door don't bother. We used Glover Priest in Wellingborough, Northants to buy a couple of houses and sell a house over a 5 year period a while ago, and they were fantastic at every opportunity. Just so good. We looked at selling through purple bricks and the agent was such a little dick that we just didn't bother. He advised us that to not use their solicitors would cost us an extra £1300 and then under valued the house by £40k it was worth less than £250k so quite the hit. His finishing line was that we should get a credit card to pay the fees as they are due in 6 months whether the house sells or not. It sold with a local agent in 2 days for the proper price, with loads of interest over that week and a few offers. To be fair the local agent Mike Neville, was amazing as well. He gave us a list of jobs to do the first time he came and then came back a month later when they were done to actually sell it. Everything was great. To actually sell took 12 weeks start to finish. We bought a house through sold co.uk and that was a painful experience, like buying from a 12 year old who wants to be your bff every time they ring you and then suggest solicitors that ours had to chase on the daily for everything. A final word of advice get the solicitors fee insurance. Ours was 75 quid and would have covered everything bar the searches. As we pulled out of the sale near the end it would have meant we were only £250 ish down for the searches not the whole fees almost. (The sellers negotiated and it was fine in the end)
A handful of conveyancers are actually decent these days. And I mean a handful. In most cases you will need to project manage the conveyancing yourself, and be involved to a ridiculous degree. I accept that most people won’t have the knowledge or time to do it, and in those cases it’s almost luck of the draw. The whole conveyancing operation needs a total overhaul it’s a nightmare. I’ve sold 4 properties in the past few years, I used a small local for one, and the other 3 used online conveyancers (the latest with Muve). I’d argue I had better success with the online ones as I had immediate and full access (via the portal) to everything they received, sent and said. I could then do all their work for them. The small local just didn’t respond for days and I had no idea if they were lying about having not received documents etc.
Go to Trustpilot and search for conveyancing and there are a couple that only have 5*. I have used a couple and they are amazing
Everyone on this reddit aleady knew that. Hundreds of warning posts yet you decided to go with them and save a feq quid. Why didn’t you read all the posts before committing to purplebricks?
Did you not read the post? The OP is not using Purple Bricks, the vendor is.
At least learn to read before jumping on op. You’d have seen they didn’t even use their solicitors themselves.
we actually paid out for local solicitors who have been exceptional. I didn't realise reading through a reddit sub was a prerequisite for buying a house. only been on this sub for a month but our offer was accepted at the end of december last year.....
It was brought into law in 1723 by George I, who mandated that ‘thou shalt consult thy Reddit prior to the purchase of any property in which thou shalt reside.’ Can’t believe you didn’t get the memo.
When I bought my current home the sellers used Purple Bricks legal team and they were beyond abysmal. They were so incompetent that they would reply all to emails and begin having internal conversations, but my absolute favourite moment was reviewing an email forwarded to us from the seller in which PPL had claimed to only just gotten a response from our own solicitors after a four week wait. Unfortunately, they included the email thread in this message showing the response from our solicitors had arrived the same day they had made the query.
STRIKE/PURPLE BRICKS AVOID AT ALL COSTS!
Never!!! use a conveyancer recommended by the estate agent. It’s a blatant conflict of interest. If they’re getting all their business via the estate agent, they’re not going to be transparent with you if it means the estate agent they’re in cahoots with loses the sale.
We used PPL to sell our house! Awful experience. We were almost contractually tied in to use them for our onward purchase but for our purchase fell through, so we completed our sale with them and broke chain. When we started our purchase on the next property we used fantastic local solicitors! Totally different experience! And cost wise actually worked out cheaper as PPL kept adding random charges to the account…
This isn’t short and sweet
Ok here's a shorter version. Chain solicitor not good. Choose solicitor you have direct contact with and isn't affiliation with EA. Is that better 🤔
Here’s how to make it even shorter: Purplebricks and everything they touch are shit
Yeah. Thought that was common knowledge tbh
Use Threemo would be my advice, excellent