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Anyone used Premier Property Lawyers?
Comments
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portsaidred wrote: »Hi as it says in the title, it's true but I am not often moved to post much on here as useful as I find everyone elses comments.
We used PPL Last year for a purchase that fell through due to our buyers losing their buyers etc. Not PPL's fault at all and we thought that the work they had done seemed, good, they kept us informed and returned the money we had paid out for searches.
So when we came to try again this year, we were happy to go with them again.
As far as we can see they have handled our sale well, it's the purchase that has made us see the light.
We have taken a chance on a repossessed property, which is in surprisingly good condition and is pretty new. We contacted our "man" Vishal by phone and discussed the situation, the need for speed 28 day completion etc. (I wont go into the potential pitfalls here, sure most of you know them). He was enthusiastic and said how he would make sure that things proceeded at the right speed etc.
Unlike the sale we noticed there seemed to be a lack of information on the purchase on the website, but we only really became worried 9 days later when the estate agents contacted us to say that the sellers were concerned as they had apparently tried to send the initial contracts to PPL only to be told they weren't acting for us in this purchase!
On contacting Vishal ourselves he said "well you haven't opened a separate case file with us!" After explaining that we didn't realise we had to and HE HAD NEVER MENTIONED THIS, despite other communication regarding mortgages etc. We then set about opening up the file. We made it clear that it was imperative he should contact the sellers to reassure them they were on board and he said he would.
6 days later (and some 17 days after we first spoke to PPL about the purchase) we were contacted again by AMG via the estate Agents to be told that as they had NO COMMUNICATION from us/PPL that they were breaking the contract and refusing to sell us the property.
To cut a long story short, the only way we were able to resurrect the deal was to sack PPL and make an improved offer on the property to show good faith. After days of waiting to see if we would be outbid, we ended up outbidding ourselves.
Once we have finally exchanged we will be seeking compensation, we have some very good evidence of their incompetence and will be taking it higher if necessary.
Like I said, 1st time poster but not a "false positive" one. I hope I am not moved to post again too soon either.
Just as an update 10 days along from my original post, the solicitors for AMG have decided that as we have not completed in 28 days of the original offer that they are not willing to proceeed with the sale!! This means that they were expecting our new conveyancers to complete in 10 days, surely almost impossible?
It's completely senseless, we are 99% of the way to our own sale and were progressing nicely with the purchase, with everything in place and enquiries sent.
Now they have not only stopped our purchase but put the property up for sale through a different estate agents. Whoever they get will probably not offer as much as us and it will take more time to complete a new deal. What a strange way to conduct business!
Anyway as we made a fresh offer, shouldn't that have set the 28 day completion back in motion? and if so shouldn't we have some sort of case againt them for reneging on this deal?. We have paid for new searches and an admin fee for a material change on our mortgage offer when it appears they had no real intention of selling to us in the end anyway.0 -
As you'll see I posted a couple of years back in this thead, and in the end we did go with PPL. I cannot say they were wonderful, but a high priority for us was fixed price conveyancing - scared of costs running amok.
We had a very qualified/knowlegeable case handler in charge of our case, but the trouble is he was very hard to get hold of; most of the time we had to deal with what seemed to be trainees, who often either didn't know the answers or didn't tune in to the question. But in fairness, when I did get hold of the man in charge, he always sorted it for us.
And just to clarify kybu, we especially wanted the same company to act on both the buying and selling side as it makes things much simpler. There is no conflict of interest, its not unethical, they are acting on your behalf in both cases, and it makes good sense. Unless I'm misunderstanding what you meant?
We may go with them again, but would know it might be a bit of a slog communicating with them!Favours are returned ... Trust is earned
Reality is an illusion ... don't knock it
There's a fine line between faith and arrogance ... Heaven only knows where the line is
Being like everyone else when it's right, is as important as being different when it's right
The interpretation you're most likely to believe, is the one you most want to believe0 -
I would not recommend any conveyancer introduced by the Estate agent. I was introduced to Premier property Lawyers via my agent, the sale fell through sue to the agents lack of diligence when assessing the purchasers ability to fund the purchase.
I am now left with a bill from the PPL even though the agreement with the agent clearly stated no legal fees are payable if the sale does not complete.
On a further point, the agent gets a huge backhander for the intro- in this case up to £1000 on a large property and on a low value property the conveyancer only gets about £40, If you went to a solicitor and they quoted £40 you would think they must be rubbish as they are so cheap!0 -
My experience with Premier Property Lawyers has on the whole been good. I have had to ring them a fair number of times to get them to do some work on our case, but on the whole they have been good and they haven't held up the transaction, in fact, the mortgage company have been far worse thanks to us having a complete useless moron deal with our case send out the same offer with a retention 3 times when the retention should have been removed on the second two offers and also the price changed which he didn't update!
As someone who is buying with no downward chain and the seller no upward chain, PPL haven't been the best, but they have got the job done with some persuasion along the way.
My case rep was Dawn Thomas, who seems very friendly and is polite on the phone. Maybe we were lucky having her as she seems very experienced and was willing to explain all the little issues along the way. On a few occasions when I rang PPL I was greeted by quite a few people who didn't really have a clue what they were doing and seemed as if they were trainee's.0 -
Hi. We used them when we used Your Move to buy and sell couple of years ago. Found them courteous and prompt at all times. One quibble:
when buying, they charged us £300 for the searches. The searches gave light to the house being in a flood area, so we withdrew. Second house,
again, £300 for searches. These threw light on another problem, gypsies in the adjacent fields. So again, we withdrew. The third house, we thourghily searched ourselves and didnnot take out searches, saving
another £300.00. Only then did The lawyers inform us it was ok n ot to have searches because we did not need a mortgage. So, how do you look at it? They chargd us twice for the searches. Were they dishonest? or did they do us a favour cos each house we searched on did have probs?0 -
I tell cash buyers that my normal process is to do all the searches that I explain in a note I send with my estimate, but that if they do not want any of them they should clearly tell me in writing. It may be that if you looked through the small print of what PPL sent you there would be something to that effect.
They have to have a standard process and whilst I criticise firms for hiding things in small print, there is also the point that if too many apparently important things are flagged up, the list gets too long and it defeats its object. So some matters do have to be relegated to detailed sections in in any terms of business to avoid boring people silly.
They may be a criticism, but I think you should be careful here, as you freely admit that the searches carried out did deter you from proceeding and you are glad about that.RICHARD WEBSTER
As a retired conveyancing solicitor I believe the information given in the post to be useful assuming any properties concerned are in England/Wales but I accept no liability for it.0 -
Although I find their online side of things pretty good (ie. all the documents you need are online), their actual service is pretty bad. They don't explain things properly or communicate with you, it's really hard to get a straight answer out of them and they don't answer or return your calls.
Also, don't trust their original quotation. They put ours up and added in a load of extra things that were only included in the small print - so they could charge whatever they like for them. They say the original quote is only an estimate (even though it is entitled "Quotation"), and they purposefully miss off things that everyone will actually need (like a money transfer fee) so that they can add in a load more at the end. In fact, our final quote looks nothing like our original quotation. :mad:
Be warned!!!!!!0 -
The vendors of the house i'm purchasing are using Premier Property Lawyers and we have had no end of problems. They take two weeks to reply to anything. The person dealing with the conveyancing is never available. They keep blaming my solicitor for everything but she has been on top of everything since day 1.
I would not recommend them to anyone.
Tom.0 -
I am exchanging contracts today for both the sale of my house and purchase of a new property.
Overall they have been effecient. If your sat at a computer all day for your job, you will find them quick to respond to any email enquiries you have. But if your more a telephone type of person, then you might find that they are a bit faceless.
One thing to be weary of.....the Final Bill. We had our quote which we thought was fixed, with the exception of unforeseen extras, but this wasn't the case. Things that were perfectly foreseeable were not included in our quote and the bill just kept rising and rising. Our original quote was for just over £3000 inc Stamp Duty but now at Exchange, our bill is just over £3700 inc Stamp Duty.
I am very dissappointed that this has been the case and although the move will go through with everything appearing to be done, my only gripe of the extras they've added has left a sour taste in the mouth. I wouldn't recommend them to anyone, simply because I want to be spiteful.0
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