Leasehold pubs

Posted by Justin on Apr 12, 2009 in Blogs, business, buying, buying-pubs, English Pub, law, legal, legal-procedure, pub-buying, pub-sale, pub-sales, pubs, selling, solicitor | 0 comments Stage 10 in my overview of pub sale and purchase procedure: ” If the pub is leasehold, it is normal that the landlord’s consent to the transfer of the lease to the buyer is needed. Whatever timescale the buyer and seller have agreed, this is subject to the need to get “licence to assign” first. Usually, the procedure for this will have been started at stage 1, so that...
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Stages 8 and 9: Exchanging contracts

Posted by Justin on Apr 4, 2009 in Blogs, buying-pubs, English Pub, legal, legal-procedure, pub-buying, pub-sale | 0 comments Once the contract wording is agreed, the buyer’s finances are in place, satisfactory search results have been received and satisfactory replies to enquiries have been given, the buyer and the seller cansign their copies of the contract and return them to their solicitors – in the buyer’s case with a deposit (usually 10% of the purchase price). This is the time to raise any...
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Stage 7: Money, money, money

Posted by Justin on Mar 24, 2009 in Blogs, business, buying, buying-pubs, English Pub, legal-procedure, pub-buying, pub-sale, pub-sales, pubs, selling, solicitor | 0 comments While all the legal investigations are being dealt with, the buyer needs to get his or her finances in place, ready to – (a) pay a deposit (usually ten per cent of the purchase price) on exchange of contracts and (b) pay the rest of the purchase money, plus legal expenses, plus the stock value, on completion As exchange of contracts and completion often take place on the same day, the...
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Stage 6 – agreeing the contract terms

Posted by Justin on Mar 15, 2009 in Blogs, business, buying, buying-pubs, English Pub, legal, legal-procedure, pub-buying, pub-sale, pub-sales, pubs, selling, solicitor | 0 comments When the seller’s solicitor prepared the draft contract, it will have included the obvious terms (eg: price) and terms to protect the seller (eg: an indemnity by the buyer in respect of post-completion debts of the business), but not necessarily any terms to protect the buyer (eg: non-competition clauses by the seller). It is the buyer’s solicitor’s job to make sure the...
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Stage 5: replying to enquiries

Posted by Justin on Mar 10, 2009 in Blogs, business, English Pub, legal-procedure, pub-sale, pub-sales, pubs, selling | 0 comments There seem to be two types of buyer’s solicitors: those who ask the seller’s solicitors to answer standard commercial enquiries, however irrelevant they are to the particular transaction, and those who raise their own enquiries ensuring they are relevant and purposeful. Similarly, there seem to be two types of seller’s solicitors: those who go through the enquiries with the...
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Searches – what are they all about?

Posted by Justin on Mar 8, 2009 in Blogs, business, buying, buying-pubs, English Pub, law, legal, legal-procedure, pub-buying, pub-sale, pub-sales, pubs, selling, solicitor | 0 comments Lawyers often talk about “the searches”, but what do they mean? The main search is the “local search” – strictly, a search in the register of local land charges maintained by the local district or borough council (or unitary authority), combined with a range of enquiries raised with that council, all in relation to the property being searched against – not in...
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