straightforward sale only, purplebricks conveyancing?

OnTheMove

sale only, freehold, no mortgage on the property & no upward chain, shouldn't be any issues as far as we are concerned (famous last words).

we're in a popular area & previous houses on our road have sold within weeks, if not days, so we're taking a bit of a chance & using a hybrid/online agent. Think it's worth the risk to possibly save on the eye-watering fees of a traditional EA, just need to get on rightmove & have assisted viewings.

we're being realistic with our asking price, it will be under what PB have advised but i'm positive that they're being overly optimistic. there's no great need for a quick sale, but would prefer it to be asap as the market seems to be in flux & I think will only to head downwards/stagnate as time passes due to financial market uncertainty with Brexit looming.

using PB conveyancing seems to make sense, but i can only find negative reviews for this. i'm guessing that you're just allocated a solicitor from a central bank of people & it's just pot luck if you get a decent one?

i'm also looking at online conveyancing for quotes & reviews as we're not local to the property any more so everything will have to be online or in the post anyway.

i'm leaning more towards not tying in with PB & going online with decent reviews? again, could be pot luck, but i don't know what other choice i've got?

sorry for being longwinded! thanks for any replies

steampowered

PB charge you an additional fee if you don't take their conveyancing services.

This is because PB get paid commission by the conveyancing firms on their panel. Of course, you end up paying for this through the amount you pay your conveyancer.

The firms on PB's panel are the cheapest online conveyancers - so you shouldn't expect great service. But I think that's probably fine if you are selling and don't have an unusually tight timeframe.

OnTheMove

steampowered wrote: »

PB charge you an additional fee if you don't take their conveyancing services.

I didn't know this, definitely not mentioned by PB agent, will check the fee out, thank you

i've just asked on PB chat & reply "no the fee does not increase, but if you chose not to use our partner conveyancer, you will be required to pay the fee upfront". i knew you had to pay up front if not using them, perhaps no additional fee has changed recently?

TamsinC

steampowered wrote: »

PB charge you an additional fee if you don't take their conveyancing services.
.

No, they don't. We used Purple Bricks for our sale and used our own solicitors and we didn't get charged any extra - this was in Jan-March THIS year. They were the best EAs we have ever had actually and it went swimmingly.

steampowered

The PB website is very opaque and doesn't seem to mention these details.

The service agreement (https://www.purplebricks.co.uk/terms/service-agreement) suggests that if you agree to take their conveyancing but change your mind, or if you take the deferred fee, you have to pay an 'administration charge' of £360 if you decide to instruct your own conveyancers.

So you might be alright if you pay up front, but if you take the deferred fee there is an extra £360 charge.

vw100

PB are good if you have a property that you know will sell quickly.

The downside is their conveyancer partner - I think might be premier property lawyers are not very good. They have a online portal where you can track the sale/purchase but tend to be a bit slow and have to chase. it also will depend on who is your conveyancer and how well they work.

If you choose PB, best to pay up front and choose your own conveyancer otherwise if you choose to pay at sale then you will have to use one of their conveyancers. There is no extra charge for either option.

sheepy21

For the love of god research your solicitor carefully, even a straightforward sale can be a nightmare if you have someone slow/incompetent. I took recommendations, searched for reviews etc. It's worth paying a bit extra for an easy life, our solicitor is about £400 more than an online one, but so far it's smooth sailing and I have no complaints

AbbieCadabra

sorry, wrong thread, can't delete.

OnTheMove

sheepy21 wrote: »

For the love of god research your solicitor carefully, even a straightforward sale can be a nightmare if you have someone slow/incompetent. I took recommendations, searched for reviews etc. It's worth paying a bit extra for an easy life, our solicitor is about £400 more than an online one, but so far it's smooth sailing and I have no complaints

reviews & research can only do so much though, we previously used a recommended solicitor who definitely wasn't cheap, our purchase took 6 months mainly down to the vendor's incompetent solicitor, but ours wasn't that much better! found out later that our solicitor was absolutely snowed under with work & we obviously suffered due to this.

ric1982

Avoid PB. Even if they give you free conveyancing! (Not exaggerating believe me).

OnTheMove

TamsinC wrote: »

No, they don't. We used Purple Bricks for our sale and used our own solicitors and we didn't get charged any extra - this was in Jan-March THIS year. They were the best EAs we have ever had actually and it went swimmingly.

good to hear, thanks. again, pot luck who your agent is, ours has got good reviews, but you never really know, especially as we're coming into peak time for selling.

it's just such an expensive decision to make & i'm dithering! if it's nothing extra to pay for PB to market & i can choose a conveyancer on reviews, i'm hopefully giving us a fighting chance of it going ok. go with PB & adds more risk if it's just whoever is free next in the very large (i imagine) central pool of who they use.