By working in partnership with clients, estate agents, and mortgage brokers our residential property lawyers ensure a smooth transaction whilst protecting your legal interests.
Your choice of property solicitor or lawyer will be the single biggest factor in determining how stressful the experience is for you, particularly when it comes to buying or selling. Our residential property solicitors offer expert advice and representation. We provide fixed-fee conveyancing quotes with absolutely no hidden charges. As would be expected, conveyancing services from Holmes & Hills Solicitors include professional advice and regular updates throughout the process.
Rightmove* and others estimate that 30% of property transactions fall-through on average, nationally, a number far higher than many anticipate. For those unlucky ones that experience this, the costs can be significant.
Those using Holmes & Hills' residential property services benefit from a materially higher successful completion rate compared to the national average for residential conveyancing lawyers. Your transaction has an increased chance of successfully completing when Holmes & Hills is advising and representing you.
From our seven offices in Colchester; Braintree; Witham; Sudbury; Halstead; Tiptree and Coggeshall we advise thousands of people across Essex and Suffolk every year in relation to conveyancing and other residential property related matters.
We also provide advice on:
What are searches and why do I need them?
If you’re getting a mortgage to help fund your purchase, your mortgage lender will often require us to carry out searches. These will usually include:
Depending on the nature of the transaction and the location of the property and the buyer’s particular requirements other searches may be required and may include Highways Searches; Chancel Check; DevAssess; Mining; Energy & Transportation; Planning. Further guidance is available here.
Yes, we have a team of specialist shared ownership lawyers in Essex and Suffolk that can advise purchasers and owners of shared ownership on all matters relating to:
Buying a freehold property means you own the property, the land it is built on and there is no fixed time limit. Buying a leasehold property means you own the property for a fixed amount of time, as you are leasing the property from the Landlord, who owns the building and the land it is built on.
All flats are leasehold and most houses are freehold in England. However, there are some leasehold houses and, in this situation, you own the property but not the land it sits on but you will usually be responsible for the maintenance of the whole property and not just the internal property and also be responsible for insurance.
With a freehold property, you have control over the maintenance of the property and land and you are free to deal with the property how you wish.
With a leasehold property, the lease is usually granted for a period between 99 years and 999 years and ground rent is payable to the Landlord every year. You are responsible for the maintenance of the internal property but there can be restrictions on alterations, particularly where they are structural.
The lease also sets out what you can and cannot do with the property. With a leasehold property the Landlord is responsible for maintenance of the building and they recover their cost through payment of service charges which you will have to contribute towards.
Because the lease is for a fixed period of time, at some stage, the lease will need to be extended and you would pay a premium to your Landlord for them to grant you with the extension.
This is to comply with the anti-money laundering regulations. This cannot be waived and is a legal requirement placed on us by the government and our regulators. It may feel like we are asking a lot of information, but please be assured we have to obtain this from all of our clients (including keeping this up to date for returning clients).
Stamp duty is a tax payable when buying property over a certain value in England. The amount depends on the purchase price and other factors such as whether you’re a first-time buyer or if you own other properties.
A Will is a legal document that allows you to direct how your assets (your “estate”) should be distributed when you die. As a homeowner, it is strongly advisable to make a Will or consider updating your current Will (which should be reviewed at regular intervals and when your circumstances change).
Without a Will your property may not pass to those you intend, and a lack of a Will can cause issues and delays for those dealing with your estate. Our specialist Wills solicitors offer expert legal advice from any one of our seven offices based in Colchester, Braintree, Witham, Halstead, Sudbury, Coggeshall and Tiptree.
It is particularly important to have a Will when you jointly own a property with another person(s) and you hold the property on trust as tenants in common. Learn more about declaration of trust.
You can meet your property lawyer face to face at any one of our seven offices across Essex & Suffolk, at any point during your residential property transaction.
Or if you prefer to keep in touch by phone or email, we are happy to do whichever is most convenient for you.
*Holmes & Hills' successful completion rate is calculated using sample data for 333 residential property transactions started between July 2022 to September 2022 and is compared to national average successful completion rate of 70.3% (provided by Rightmove, 13/02/2023).
Holmes & Hills property solicitors can be accessed at seven offices across Essex and Suffolk.
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