Conveyancing in Reading / Farnborough area - Bennetts?

gwapenut

Hi
Just wondered if anyone had any recommendations? I have decided against online conveyancing.

In particular I wondered if anyone had any direct experience of Bennetts Conveyancing Solictors in Farnborough? (PM me if you prefer!)

Thanks!

nnj10

gwapenut wrote: »

Hi
Just wondered if anyone had any recommendations? I have decided against online conveyancing.

In particular I wondered if anyone had any direct experience of Bennetts Conveyancing Solictors in Farnborough? (PM me if you prefer!)

Thanks!

I am also looking for a solicitor for my purchase in Reading.
Just saw on their website, they do not mention about "Disbursements".
Their professional fees are indeed much cheaper to most offline convenacers I have come across.

gwapenut

I'm going to give them a try for an (unconnected) sale and purchase.

Anyone - feel free to PM me in a couple of months time for feedback. Sometimes takes me a while to spot new PMs so please be patient ...!

little_lil

We have just instructed Bennetts on our house sale and purchase, we did this on the recommendation of a friend who found them reasonable and helpful. She actually moved last Friday and there was a problem on the day and she said that Bennetts were fab and handled the situation really well - and kept her sane!!

gwapenut

I have also had a PM recommending them.

Nice to see all the recommenders having such high post counts, having not joined on the day of the recommendation, and not stopped using this site - even to browse - a few minutes after making their recommendation. Naming no names ... but TGINF!

little_lil

having just exchanged today I just wanted to give a quick update on my experience with Bennetts and tbh I cannot fault their service. I would thoroughly recommend them to anyone looking for a conveyancer in any part of the country. I live fairly local but all of the business was done on the phone and via email. we also had a rather notoriously inefficient firm above us in the chain and Bennetts were on the ball all the time, chasing and trying to get questions answered. Even when my solicitor had a holiday the sale was dealt with by other members of the firm, with confidence and knowledge.

Oh and their costs were extremely reasonable - no hidden charges, even though we had two sales and one purchase not go through.

gwapenut

little_lil wrote: »

having just exchanged today I just wanted to give a quick update on my experience with Bennetts and tbh I cannot fault their service. I would thoroughly recommend them to anyone looking for a conveyancer in any part of the country. I live fairly local but all of the business was done on the phone and via email. we also had a rather notoriously inefficient firm above us in the chain and Bennetts were on the ball all the time, chasing and trying to get questions answered. Even when my solicitor had a holiday the sale was dealt with by other members of the firm, with confidence and knowledge.

Oh and their costs were extremely reasonable - no hidden charges, even though we had two sales and one purchase not go through.

I have had one exchange/completion with them and two further exchanges in this 3-house 6-month marathon (deliberate, not the solicitors fault) spanning from March until ... next Friday. I will update post completion!

gwapenut

Well I'm very late updating. They were fab. A few buyer-induced pitfalls which they handled brilliantly on one of the sales

Sadly though the proprieter appears to have disappeared and we've had an email from another law firm saying they were "intervening".

As we completed 6 months ago, it seems like we had a lucky escape, which is a shame as the service we received was friendly and top-notch, and the prices rock bottom. Would have recommended them to anyone.

gwapenut

It seems that Jake Bennett was required as far back as 2009 to submit half yearly accounts (now there are alarm bells if anyone needed them!). He has now been made bankrupt.

So perhaps a tip for anyone asking this kind of question in the future .. check the Solicitors Regulation Authority website (below) for any hints of trouble. All the information and warnings I needed were there. That said, I'm saddened because the staff were great and they did an excellent job for me - much better than an online conveyancer, they were more than happy for me to pop into their office. In fact, they were the best conveyancers or solicitors I'd ever used for a house purchase and I've gone for some pretty pricey local solicitor recommendations in the past! This was the first firm who did not seem irretrievably lazy in their approach ...

Full history here:
http://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/solicitor-check/033882.article