How to keep the conveyancing process moving smoothly

*The information in this blog relates to England and Wales only

I think this is a relatively easy one to answer. Ensuring the relationship with your conveyancing team is healthy, the communication is good and you work as a team will always deliver a quicker timeframe to completion. As an agent making sure the file is set up correctly and (vendor, buyer) knows what they’re doing and when to do it, including completing and returning documents/ID, contracts being sent out quickly, searches being ordered promptly, mortgage valuations and or surveys being booked in timely, will all help shave approximately three weeks off the overall completion timeframe.

Agent having their finger on the pulse when there’s a chain involved and actively chasing other parties in their chain as you’re only as good as your weakest link, so identifying problems and dealing with them promptly will keep the whole thing moving. If you only progress your part of the chain as an agent and don’t make sure everyone is keeping up it will lead to prolonged weeks passing, which increases the chances of it falling through.

If the property you are selling is a leasehold, I would always ask your vendor to ring their management company, tell them they’ve sold their property and need to pay for a pack now so there are no delays. Explain to your vendor if they don’t it will unfortunately hold everything up.

Make yourself available to help chase “If there is any chasing I can do to help this purchase then please don’t hesitate to contact me”

Don’t leave any stone unturned. Enquiries can be the bain of our existence so it’s crucial to find out what enquiries solicitors are waiting on if it starts to drag. Once you know what the enquiries are approach your buyer/seller and ask them can I help you with any of these? Sometimes layman terms can be powerful as not everyone speaks conveyancer so being able to explain in a different way can be helpful with getting any last enquiries answered and boxed off to keep the sale moving.