Chancel repairs liability

Posted by Justin on Feb 18, 2010 in Abaddons Musings, conveyancing, legal system, risk | 0 comments Having had to carry out a little extra research than normal into this topic, I thought I’d share the results by gathering together various links on the subjectFor background information, Wikipedia has an accurate, if brief entry. Other authoritative information is available from the church, and a Times Online article The report on the Wallbank court case that brought this “new”...
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Home Information Packs – yet again

Posted by Justin on Feb 16, 2010 in Abaddons Musings, conveyancing, HIPs, legal system | 1 comment With a general election looming, the Conservatives are consulting various interested parties on what to do about HIPs – abolish then, improve them or leave them as they are?My view is that, if done properly, a HIP can be a very good way of speeding up the house buying and selling process. The problem is that most sellers get a HIP because they must, and buy as cheaply as they can, instead...
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Property theft

Posted by Justin on Feb 15, 2010 in Abaddons Musings, conveyancing, legal system, risk | 0 comments Properties can be stolen: if a fraudster is able to convince the Land Registry that they are the property owner, they can sell – or more likely – mortgage the property and disappear with the proceeds before you are aware anything is wrong. In the case of a mortgage, this might not be until the mortgage lender tries to take possession for non-payment of the mortgage instalments, at...
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Speedy service

Posted by Justin on Feb 15, 2010 in Abaddons Musings, conveyancing, lawyers, professionals, service | 0 comments Even for ex-clients, we offer a speedy serviceWe acted when husband and wife bought a house together in 2006. They are splitting up, and he does not want to use us as we have acted for her on various transactions over the past few years. They have therefore gone to a “neutral” firm to handle the sale of the house.This morning, we received an email from the wife, asking for a...
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Home Information Packs (again!)

Posted by Justin on Nov 25, 2009 in Abaddons Musings, conveyancing, estate agents, HIPs, lawyers, legal system | 0 comments I know I keep banging on about this, but it is my view that a combination of inadequate consultation by government, vested interests in the property industry trying to stifle change and competition on price rather than value resulted in a huge missed opportunity. Home Information Packs, properly prepared, can be of great benefit in streamlining conveyancing, to the benefit of all concerned:...
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Why don’t HIPs include contracts?

Posted by Justin on Apr 25, 2009 in Abaddons Musings, conveyancing, lawyers, legal system | 2 comments If HIPs (Home Information Packs) were really meant to provide a comprehensive package of pre-contract documents to speed up the conveyancing process, why do they not include a draft contract?It is not because of any technical difficulty: the draft contract can be prepared at the same time as a property information form (see my earlier post). The details of the buyer and the price would need to...
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