SDLT & Land Registry Qs.

fivemice

Hi

Just received a letter from our solicitor confirming all the charges for conveyancing on our house purchase.

It says "We are now required to complete, on your behalf, a Land Transaction Return which comprises of 6 pages and some 71 questions for which we shall need your National Insurance number. As a result we will be making an additional charge of £58.75."

Can we not do the Stamp Duty ourselves?

And also the Land Registry - is that something we can do ourselves, and does it need to be paid before or after completion? If after, what is the deadline for doing so? I believe SDLT is 28 days.

RabbitMad

In theory you can but my solicitor wouldn't let me. I wanted to do it myself for a cash flow perspective as my solicitor didn't explicitly charge extra for doing it but they said they couldn't let me do it as my mortgage company insisted on the solicitor completing the form.

olly300

RabbitMad, your mortgage company is being funny as you are legally liable for all HMRC fines for not submitting a stamp duty form, submitting an incorrect form or submitting it late NOT your solicitor.

I did mine myself.

If you are buying a freehold property it's much easier to complete. You need the vendors correct details and the name and address of their solicitor. Photocopy the form and fill in the photocopy first. Use black ink only.

Go to http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/contactus/staustellform.htm you need form SDLT1 and the notes, SDLT6 if it is for a residential house/flat with 2 or less buyers & vendors. You can ring them up but I can't find the number.

Most solicitors make sure you pay the stamp duty before completion.

benood

For peace of mind I would pay the £58, if you don't there will always be a nagging fear of hassle when you come to sell again.

Richard_Webster

Mortgage lender not being funny.

Lender's ultimate concern is that the title to the property is registered in the buyer's name and the lender's mortgage is also registered there.

Although you can complete the SDLT1 form yourself the solicitor has to make sure it is completed properly because transfer to you and the mortgage cannot be registered at the Land Registry unless a SDLT clearance form has been provided which obviously only comes once the form and any tax due have been sent in.

Solicitor has to protect lender and if you never completed the form and paid the tax then lender wouldn't end up having its mortgage registered against the title so solicitor must oversee the process.

I don't charge extra - I put my fees up to cover the cost of doing this. Charging extra is a disguised way of making an initial purchase quote figure looking lower than it really is and I don't like it.

As a conveyancing solicitor I believe the information given in the post to be useful but I accept no liability except to fee-paying clients

olly300

Richard_Webster wrote: »

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Although you can complete the SDLT1 form yourself the solicitor has to make sure it is completed properly because transfer to you and the mortgage cannot be registered at the Land Registry unless a SDLT clearance form has been provided which obviously only comes once the form and any tax due have been sent in.

The buyer not the solicitor gets fined for not completing the form which is why most solicitors don't exchange until the form has been filled in and they have the cash. If you complete it yourself your solicitor will claim not to check it.

There was a thread on here about a week ago where the solicitor completed the form and put the incorrect year on a SDLT return. The poster got a letter from HMCR with a fine added for late completion. They had to contact their solicitor to inform them of this and get it sorted out.

Richard_Webster wrote: »

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I don't charge extra - I put my fees up to cover the cost of doing this. Charging extra is a disguised way of making an initial purchase quote figure looking lower than it really is and I don't like it.

You must be one of the few All the quotes I got had this separately.

The OP should have a look on the form online and decide whether to complete it themselves or not. I forget that not everyone on here is use to/capable of/has the time to complete tax forms.

Richard_Webster

The buyer not the solicitor gets fined for not completing the form which is why most solicitors don't exchange until the form has been filled in and they have the cash. If you complete it yourself your solicitor will claim not to check it.

I agree that if you do the form yourself you might be able to save the money but the mortgage lender won't accept the solicitor's excuse that he didn't check the form if that prejudices its security. If the solicitor is silly enough not to check the form and you can save the money by completing it yourself, then fair enough!

There was a thread on here about a week ago where the solicitor completed the form and put the incorrect year on a SDLT return. The poster got a letter from HMCR with a fine added for late completion. They had to contact their solicitor to inform them of this and get it sorted out

In this kind of case the solicitor will have to pay the penalty if he can't get out of it - if he made the mistake it is hardly the client's fault. I've got a couple of cases myself which were fairly complicated and I ended up sending them to what turned out to be the wrong office, and because of that, by the time they reached the right office we were out of time, and penalties got charged. I've appealed against the penalties but if the appeals are unsuccessful I can scarcely charge the clients the penalties that are nothing to do with them - that's just something I'll have to stand.

[IAs a conveyancing solicitor I believe the information given in the post to be useful but I accept no liability except to fee-paying clients][/I]