What Are Enquiries When Buying A House?

In almost every property conveyancing transaction you deal with, a key milestone before Exchange of Contracts and importantly, Completion can take place, is the Title Enquiry Stage. Whether you are the seller or the buyer, both you and your respective conveyancers will have a role to play during this stage. On this article, we look at what raising enquiries mean when buying a house. We also aim to explain what it looks like from both the seller’s and the buyer’s perspective separately so you can understand what the process looks like from either side of the fence.

Background

Typically, your house buying journey begins with you viewing a property (through an estate agent or not), before making an offer. In England and Wales, the offer being accepted does not amount to a formal contract. It simply acts as the starting point for the legal process of transferring ownership of the property.

Regulatory requirements mean that extensive due diligence must be conducted against both the property in question and also the individuals involved in a transaction. We have discussed the enquiries in relation to anti-money laundering and identity fraud in an earlier article. Broadly, these involve ‘background check’s including but not limited to searching public records such as credit reports, criminal records, and bankruptcy filings etc. We have covered this aspect of a transaction in an earlier article. What we will be focusing on within this article are enquiries relating to the property and title matters.

The Starting Point

The seller’s conveyancer usually begin the conveyancing process by producing and issuing a contract pack; commonly known as Draft Contract Papers. They do this by first obtaining a copy of the title deeds from the Land Registry. These title deeds (official copy entries) are then accompanied by a number of standard forms completed by the seller (known as Protocol Forms) and a copy of the Contract.

Protocol Forms have been put together with the Law Society with the hope that they capture as much information regarding the property at a very early stage in the transaction. These questions range from who owns and is responsible for maintaining the boundaries to the property, any building work carried out to the property since it was originally constructed, an inventory, to what the ground rent is where the property is leasehold.

Whilst the seller’s solicitor prepares the Draft Contract Bundle, it is also quite common for the buyer of the property to carry out a home survey. A surveyor carries out a survey and therefore their expertise falls outside our remit as conveyancers. There are varying levels of surveys that you can carry out and we have a detailed article on our site that explains these. Typically, a survey would cost you anywhere between £150-£500.

What Does Raising Enquiries Mean When Buying A House?

By this time, and in most instances, the purchaser’s conveyancer has now received both the seller’s draft contract pack and a survey result where one is available. The conveyancer will now start reviewing these documents in detail. Each time where the information supplied is inconsistent with what the Deeds, Survey result or the Estate Agents Particulars, the buyer’s conveyancer will be raising a question. This is in essence what an enquiry is.

What Are The Typical Enquiries Raised During A Property Transaction?

This is a very broad question and one we cannot supply a standard response to. The reason for this is that enquiries when buying a house are specific to a particular property transaction. Additionally, The Conveyancing Quality Scheme (CQS) which is a framework most reputable conveyancing service providers have signed up to, prohibit standard enquiries being raised during a property transaction. What this means is that purchasers can only raise those enquiries which are otherwise revealed by carrying out specific searches and surveys.

This therefore means that the conveyancer representing the purchaser must truly think about what enquiries would be relevant to each property transaction they represent from a practical context before they raise enquiries.

To give you an example, if the Protocol Forms or Estate Agents particulars reveal that there is a log burner at the property, you could expect the purchaser’s conveyancer to ask the sellers to produce a building regulation certificate for its installation. By contrast, they could not use this as a standard enquiry to be raised on each transaction they act for as a precedent.

The reason why this is so, is with a view to reduce the time it takes for transactions to complete by reducing the number of irrelevant enquiries being raised, all of which requires the seller’s and their conveyancer’s time in considering these.

The process of raising specific enquiries will now continue until the purchaser’s conveyancer receive complete and satisfactory replies for all enquiries raised, from the seller’s conveyancer. It is also worth noting that property searches are typically expected to be returned at this stage. The purchaser’s conveyancer may also have to raise any additional enquiries as a result of any further revelations identified on the property searches.

Generally, most standard property transactions involving a residential property would require a standard local authority, drainage and environmental search. There may be a requirement to conduct additional searches such as coal and radon searches, depending on where the subject property is located in the country.

Once replies have been successfully received for all these enquiries, the purchaser’s conveyancer will then proceed to compile a Report on the purchase property. This is what’s known as the Report on Contract and Title. Once issued, this generally marks the end of pre-exchange legalities involved in a transaction.

What If You Are The Seller?

It is widely accepted that conveyancing transactions are driven by the purchaser. The reason for this ultimately derives from the old Latin Phrase, Caveat Emptor which simply translates to Buyer Be Aware. It is therefore perfectly reasonable to expect a buyer and their conveyancer to raise relevant enquiries they deem necessary before being in a position to proceed to exchange of contracts. Law Society’s Conveyancing Quality Scheme (CQS) has attempted to implement a framework which limits the number of enquiries a buyer could raise however experience suggests that a seller’s reluctance to supply complete responses to buyer’s enquiries tend to alienate buyers jeopardising a transaction than not.

What Should You Therefore Do As A Seller with Enquiries when buying a house?

The seller’s solicitor will typically only relay non-technical questions to the seller to respond. These enquiries generally range from work carried out at the property to matters such as covenants. Either way, if at any point, you as the seller is unclear about any of the enquiries, you should always consult your solicitor for guidance as to how to complete the relevant response.

Ultimately, what is required is your honest response to the questions asked. It is often the case where the enquiry stage reveals instances with which the sellers may have carried out something to or at the property which the deeds or regulations such as local planning laws prohibit. Your conveyancer is there to advice you on suitable steps to then take to correct any of these issues.

What Happens After Enquiries When Buying A House?

Typically, once enquiries have all been dealt with and the purchaser’s solicitor has issued the Report on Contract and Title to the buyer, arrangements are usually made to collect the purchaser’s deposit and discuss proposed completion dates.

In Conclusion

We hope our article has given a general but detailed overview of what this crucial milestone during any conveyancing transaction entails. Each property transaction is unique in its own way and therefore you may find this stage of the transaction proceed far quicker than others and vice versa.

House buying and selling is an emotional affair and we, as conveyancers, recognise that most clients would prefer to complete a property transaction as quickly as possible. That said, ensuring that this stage of the transaction concludes fully and satisfactorily is vitally important, especially if you are the purchaser to ensure you do not encounter any nasty surprises when it is your turn to sell the property in the future.