What happens when you sell a house?
Our conveyancing solicitors see it as an important part of their job to make sure that you understand the process of selling a house and that you always know at what stage you are up to with the sale of your house.
Below is our simple guide to the steps involved when you sell a house. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to phone Darbys to speak to a conveyancing solicitor, free of charge on 0845 567 5000.
1. Starting the ball rolling
When you have decided to put your house on the market and agreed a price with your estate agent, you have a choice. You can wait until a buyer is found before you do anything else, or you can take various steps now which will speed up the process later by using our SALE+ service. The SALE+ pack that we prepare for you will give your buyer important information about your house and will speed the conveyancing process up.
2. Preparing a contract
Either at the outset if you opt for our SALE+ service or when you have found a buyer, we will send you a number of standard forms and questionnaires to complete about the house. Our friendly and experienced residential property lawyers will also obtain a copy of the title deeds for your property from the Land Registry. All of this information allows us to draw up a draft contract which we then send to the buyer's solicitors. They may ask for some changes to be made to the contract and we will arrive at a form of contract that everyone is happy with.
3. The buyer digs deeper...
The buyer's solicitors will check through the documents we send them, and may ask us to provide any further information which they think is important (e.g. copy planning permissions, guarantees etc.) They will also send off their searches about the property such as asking the Local Authority about any matter affecting the property (the Local Search) and also an Environmental and Drainage Search which will tell them about the surrounding land, water pipes and sewers.
4. The buyer gets the money together
While the searches are going on, the buyer will be making sure that they have enough money to proceed. If the buyer is buying the house with the help of a loan (a mortgage) his mortgage company will arrange for the property to be valued.
5. Getting ready to make the deal legally-binding.
As yet, either party can walk away from the deal. It is only when contracts have been exchanged that the deal is legally binding. As we head towards making it legally binding, we get a copy of the agreed contract from the buyer's solicitors and our residential conveyancing team send this to you for you to sign and return to us. The buyer's solicitors get the buyer to do the same. Both sets of solicitors now hold a contract that has been signed by their clients.
6. Fixing a move-out date
The next step is to agree a move-out date (the completion date). We liaise between everyone to agree a date when everything will be completed and when the buyer will get the keys.
7. Making the deal legally-binding - exchange of contracts
Once everyone has agreed to a completion date, your property solicitor will send your signed contract over to the buyer's solicitors. In return we will get a copy of the contract signed by the buyer. At that point the buyer will also send to us the deposit money which is typically between 5% and 10% of the sale price. It is at this point that contracts are said to have been exchanged, and the deal becomes legally binding. Everyone will now work towards the agreed completion date, when the buyer will get the keys to your house.
8. The Transfer
The buyer's solicitors will draft a document called the Transfer. This document shows that you are transferring the property (selling the property) to the sellers. We will send this to you by email or post for you to sign and send back to us. Your signature must be witnessed by an independent person (i.e. not a relative).
9. Clearing your mortgage
The buyer will not want to buy your house if there is a charge over it in favour of your bank or building society. After we have exchanged contracts, to make sure that any mortgage is cleared off your house, we ask your mortgage company to tell us how much is owed to them. This is called a settlement figure. We will also ask your estate agents to send us their invoice for you to approve.
10. The Big Day arrives
On the move-out date the buyer's solicitors will electronically transfer the balance of the purchase price to our bank account. When we let you know that we have received the money, we will ask your estate agents to hand over the keys to the buyer. The buyer can then start moving in and you have now sold your house!
11. The final steps
On the day of completion, we pay off your mortgage, and we pay your estate agents. We then deduct our own charges and we send you the balance of the monies that we received from the buyer.
We hope you have found this information useful and you have a better idea of how the selling a house process works.
As we say, we are always there for people and families who are in our PURPLE LEGAL scheme. We invite you to join PURPLE LEGAL now. By joining PURPLE LEGAL, you can have all your legal enquiries answered free of charge by simply booking a SolicitorSlot for a time and date that suits you. Alternatively if you wish to speak to us now, please click on "Please Contact Me Now” or call us on 0845 567 5000. We look forward to always being there for you.
