Is VAT Payable on these Solicitor Costs ?

Leodogger

jayencee wrote: »

They do a lot more work than the estate agent does, but for much less money. The forms you are asked to fill in nowadays are getting longer because legislation is changing all the time, and everybody wants to cover themselves. Who knows the property better than the owner?

I don't buy that, an estate agent has to send out agents to conduct viewings (at least ours did and the best ones do), they pay to market the property after first sending out an agent to measure up and they vigorously mail out details to "potential" clients and chase them up afterwards for a week if need be to get feed back, they are also constantly on the phone answering potential clients questions to ensure the sale goes through. I know you can market your properly on the net but you don't get the same vigorous service and selling technique an estate agent on the High Street gives, plus the High Street shops have dozens of offices which they are renting and cars / petrol costs of travelling around whilst solicitors operate out of one office and go nowhere ! Admittedly estate agents charge a lot but their overheads are much higher. A solicitor is handling dozens of transactions all at the same time and the individual sales transaction for probably an hour out of the whole process at the end, the secretaries do most of the work, I know I worked for a solicitor and I was run ragged! Most of the forms are standard and they expect the owner to do most of their work from what I can see. A typical example is the SDLT return. My sister did her own and had never filled one in in her life before but saved the £75 standard charge. Let's face it, this is probably held as a standard form on the secretary's computer and most of the "general" questions are probably inputted by her and then checked by the solicitor. Solicitor's only employ their legal knowledge at the end of the process to vet the paperwork.

kingstreet

I regularly use three firms around Birmingham and not one of them makes an extra charge for completion of the SDLT return and not one charges a separate fee for "acting for mortgage lender."

This seems to be a practisc employed by some firms to make their headline rates appear lower.

The firms I use charging £450 + VAT + disbursements do not have additional charges for the things mentioned.

When shopping around, it is important to establish the exact fees involved by obtaining a written quote which will set out all the fees and disbursements for a particular property in a particular area.

Richard_Webster

the forms have become more and more complicated and longer and longer to be completed by the client

This is because of our blame culture and the bureaucratic requirements of mortgage lenders - so there is more for us to check now - so we actually spend more time looking into it all and asking questions and then explaining the meaning of the answers!

Most of it hasn't got much to do with everyday life. For instance, if double glazing was put in before April 2002 nobody is concerned, but after that you are supposed to have FENSA certificate and if you don't have one we have to mess around and get indemnity policies to keep mortgage lenders happy even though the chances of the Council taking enforcement action about it are virtually nil. Tell the mortgage lenders this so we don't have to waste our time on this kind of thing.

OK most people just want to move and aren't interested in the legal details - but if something happens after they moved in - they come back to their solicitor and say "you didn't warn me this could happen...!" My reply would be: "Oh yes I did, read my report again!" (In the above "FENSA" issue the point is that when you come to sell another solicitor will want to see the certificate (and you could moan if you had to pay for a policy because we hadn't got your sellers to pay for one), so even though it hasn't got much to do with everyday life - we have to check the point because another solicitor will in the future.)

There are lots of points like that! So we do have more to do - and the forms are longer as a result.

Dan-Dan

I begrudge the EA , i dont begrude the Solicitor

One studied hard to earn good money , the other spent a fortune on spot cream and hair gel

Leodogger

Richard_Webster wrote: »

This is because of our blame culture and the bureaucratic requirements of mortgage lenders - so there is more for us to check now - so we actually spend more time looking into it all and asking questions and then explaining the meaning of the answers!

Most of it hasn't got much to do with everyday life. For instance, if double glazing was put in before April 2002 nobody is concerned, but after that you are supposed to have FENSA certificate and if you don't have one we have to mess around and get indemnity policies to keep mortgage lenders happy even though the chances of the Council taking enforcement action about it are virtually nil. Tell the mortgage lenders this so we don't have to waste our time on this kind of thing.

OK most people just want to move and aren't interested in the legal details - but if something happens after they moved in - they come back to their solicitor and say "you didn't warn me this could happen...!" My reply would be: "Oh yes I did, read my report again!" (In the above "FENSA" issue the point is that when you come to sell another solicitor will want to see the certificate (and you could moan if you had to pay for a policy because we hadn't got your sellers to pay for one), so even though it hasn't got much to do with everyday life - we have to check the point because another solicitor will in the future.)

There are lots of points like that! So we do have more to do - and the forms are longer as a result.

I agree that bureaucracy is running our lives at a time when most people are cash strapped and this is what happens when Health & Safety, Local Government & the EU rules run our lives which is unnecessary. People bought and sold houses for decades without all the problems you are talking about. If you bought a house 30 yrs ago and had a problem with the double glazing etc. the new owner sorted it out, buyer beware and all that. These days authorities and the ruling governments think we are all kids needing to be walked through every namby pamby area of our lives. I resent it !

Just money for the banks and building societies as usual selling you indemnity insurance and fees for this and that to provide the mortgage funds to buy it without any risk to them ! :mad: