Advice on Buying current House from Landlord/friend the cheapest simplest way

pcfixmanchester

Hi
We currently rent a house from a friend who we trust. Been here 2 years and the house is good though does need a few things doing. Friend is thinking of selling up and given us first refusal at a good price.
Really want to know the cheapest legal way of buying a house if the seller and buyer are known to each other and trusted.
We are going to get a Full Structural Survey done to ensure no hidden nasties, any advice on what to ask for.
Will be a 40% deposit so hoping mortgage not a big problem, and borrowing less than 3 x Salary.
Really want to know how to make savings on the solicitors side and what actually needs to be done to buy/sell in the simplest cheapest fashion.

Hope you can help
Andy ;-)

Doozergirl

You can't save money on solicitors etc because you're friends. It's all needed for mortgage security purposes so you can't cut corners at all.

No HIP needed which saves your friend money, not you.

pcfixmanchester

Thanks for replying

Is there nothing we (me and friend) can do that to make things easier for the solicitors that would make their bill lower ?

From reading the other threads some people seem to have have hugely complicated affairs so thought they would have bigger solicitors bills. hope that there would be things we could do to make it as stream lined as possible.

Its below the Stamp Duty threshold, if that makes a difference.

As a FTB not sure how it all works so apologise if this is daft question. but what do the solicitors actually do ? Is it not just a case of handing money over from our mortgage company and getting deeds to house ? I dont mean that in an ironic sense, I really do not know what actual tasks a solicitor performs on a house purhcase.

Thanks for the reply, glad we can save on the HIP, Do we definetly not need one ? I thought they were a legal requirement or is that only if its sold via an estate agent.

Its not a case of him saving money not me, we friends so share any savings made by reducing what I pay. So any tips on the seller side most welcome.

Thanks
Andy ;-)

DawnW

Solicitors fees on an uncomplicated purchase are not that much - after all, you state that you are having a full structural survey done, and that is not cheap. Why not ring round a few local solicitors firms and ask?

david29dpo

You dont need a HIP because there is no marketing.

talksurvey

well, take survey report and finalize what you want to do.

Paid Surveys

pcfixmanchester

Thanks Dawn & David for the replies.

Will start speaking to Solicitors now I got some initial feedback from you all.


Andy ;-)

Doozergirl

The solicitor makes sure that the house is sound from the legal perspective - that the person selling the house owns it, that the mortgage is paid off before it's released to you, that the land it sits on isn't contaminated, that it's connected up to the mains services, that no-one plans to knock it down. They will deal with your mortgage company, register the sale with the land registry. It isn't simple, a house is a big purchase and your mortgage company will be very keen to see that the house is good - even if you aren't! If it's a leasehold then there is even more work to be done.

Straightforward purchases aren't created by being friendly unfortunately. They are a happy accident. I wouldn't say they cost less, I'd say they don't cost more because there's a price you're expecting and if something goes wrong that would increase, rather than them giving you a discount when it all goes fine.

pcfixmanchester

Thanks
Thats exactly the sort of detail I was after.
I definitely want to do everything correctly and to know the house is good (we lived here for 3 years) but thought it was worth asking on here in case there were some money saving opportunities ;-)

Thanks again, and sorry if it was too basic a question

Andy ;-)

Doozergirl

It wasn't too basic. It would be lovely if there were money to be saved. At least you know about the HIP.

Your full survey will reap reward as well. It will scare the bejesus out of you but it will illustrate where the house isn't perfect and it does help with knocking the price down if you're instinct isn't to move out immediately after reading it

Post the results up here if you need a bit of reality check on it.

Richard_Webster

The solicitor makes sure that the house is sound from the legal perspective - that the person selling the house owns it, that the mortgage is paid off before it's released to you, that the land it sits on isn't contaminated, that it's connected up to the mains services, that no-one plans to knock it down. They will deal with your mortgage company, register the sale with the land registry. It isn't simple, a house is a big purchase and your mortgage company will be very keen to see that the house is good - even if you aren't! If it's a leasehold then there is even more work to be done.

Straightforward purchases aren't created by being friendly unfortunately. They are a happy accident. I wouldn't say they cost less, I'd say they don't cost more because there's a price you're expecting and if something goes wrong that would increase, rather than them giving you a discount when it all goes fine.

I agree. The problem is that a lot of the stuff we do is quite technical and difficult to explain.

All I can say is that if a problem comes up later, it is often the case that the risk of it happening will have been explained by the solicitor in his report. There are all kinds of weird and obscure things that can happen - look at the long threads about Chancel Repairs on this forum - where there is a risk of a problem in some cases, but the risk is very small, but if it actually occurred that a Church started asking for money, the average buyer would be very cross his solicitor had not warned him of the risk and arranged insurance to protect him.