Residential Conveyancing: Sales

The Solicitors Regulatory Authority, the body which regulates law firms, require us to provide you with information on our costs in relation to certain legal services which we provide.  This is so that you have the information you need to make an informed choice of legal service provider, and an understanding as to what the total cost of that service may be.

One such legal service is the sale, purchase and mortgage of residential property.

The fees which we charge for residential conveyancing depend on a wide variety of factors including but not limited to whether the transaction is a sale or purchase, where the property is, and whether it is a flat or a house.

We have provided information on the potential costs for sales, purchases and re-mortgages and listed the factors which may cause those costs to increase. However, fees will vary from property to property and can on occasion be significantly more that the ranges given.  We can give you an accurate figure once we have specific information about the property including having sight of the relevant documentation.

This page details our pricing structure for property sales.

The legal fees you will pay for a property sale is based on the price of the property, the location of the property and any specific circumstances. The basic legal fee, as shown in Table 1 below, is determined by a sliding scale based on property value. The more expensive the property, the higher that basic fee will be.  This is due to the amount of risk attached to higher value sales.

Our fees cover all the work required to complete the sale of your property.

Table 1 below shows the range of fees we can charge for a property of a particular price. For a specific quote, please contact your local office.  The specific circumstances are shown in table 2 and disbursements in table 3

Table 1

Sale  Price Fee Range excl VAT Fee Range incl VAT charged at 20%
£0-100,000 £850-1100 £1020-1320
£100,001-200,000 £950-1200 £1140-1440
£200,001-300,000 £1000-1250 £1200-1500
£300,001-400,000 £1050-1300 £1260-1560
£400,001-500,000 £1100-1350 £1320-1620
£500,001-600,000 £1150-1400 £1380-1680
£600,001-700,000 £1200-1500 £1440-1800
£700,001-800,000 £1250-1550 £1500-1860
£800,001-900,000 £1300-1600 £1560-1920
£900,001-1,000,000 £1350-1650 £1620-1980

For properties valued at over £1,000,000 fees will be calculated using the hourly rate of the lawyer undertaking the work on your behalf.  Please contact your local office for a bespoke quotation.

The current hourly rate bands are set out below.  These rates do not include VAT which will be charged at 20%.

Senior Partners and Consultants £220-£350
Junior Partners £190-£300
Solicitors/Senior Executives £150-£275
Legal Executives and Senior Clerks £140-£200
Trainee Solicitors and Clerks £100-£175

We will charge additional fees (on top of the fees referred to above) for the each of the following specific circumstances:

Table 2

 Circumstance Fee excl VAT Fee incl VAT charged at 20%
A Leasehold Flat * £500 – £1500 £600- £1800
A Shared Ownership sale (where you currently own a share in a property (and the landlord owns the other share) * £250 £300
Redeeming a Help To Buy Equity Loan £100 £120
Selling a property with Solar Panels £100 £120
Selling where the lender has issued repossession proceedings £75 £90
Electronic Money Transfer Fee £30 £36

There will also be disbursements payable.  These are cost relating to your matter that are payable to 3rd parties. We handle the payment of these fees to the 3rd party to ensure a smoother process.

Table 3

The first three disbursements below are obtained through our system search provider and includes their administration fee which are £0.34p, £1.00 and £0.50p respectively (plus VAT at 20%).

Disbursement Cost excluding VAT Cost including VAT at 20%
Index Map Search £4.34 £5.20
Copies of the register of title and plan (per title number) £7.00 £8.40
Copies of documents referred to in the register of title (per document) £3.50 £4.20
SIGN IT (Powered by DocuSign – Per Parcel) – inc VAT £2.00 £2.40
Enhanced AML Search  – inc VAT £6.00 £7.20
Questionnaire/Law Society Transaction Forms (inc covering documents for signing) – per person £6.50 £7.80

If you are referred to Butcher & Barlow by an introducer where we pay them a referral fee, we will provide you with details of the arrangement and the fee we pay in our client care letter that we will send to you at the beginning of the transaction.  This fee is paid by us so that there is no additional charge for you to pay.

*  There will be additional disbursements payable where a property is leasehold.  These will be set out in the specific lease relating to the property. These disbursements are usually payable to the Freeholder or Management Company (or both). We will advise you on the actual disbursements once we have had sight of the lease.

Our fees assume that:

  • This a standard transaction and that no unforeseen matters will arise including for example (but not limited to) a defect in title which require remedying prior to completion or the preparation of additional documents ancillary to the main transaction, a first registration of title prior to a sale, or a sale of part.
  • The transaction is concluded in a timely manner and no unreasonable complications arise.
  • All parties in the transaction are cooperative and there is no unreasonable delay from third parties providing documentation.
  • No indemnity policies are required. Additional disbursements may be required if an indemnity policy is required.
  • That the transaction is in the name of an individual only and not a company. If you are selling in the name of a company, please call your nearest office for a quotation.
  • That the transaction is not in connection to or relating to any commercial transaction. If this is the case, please call our Gadbrook Park office for a quotation.

How long will my sale take?

How long it will take from you accepting an offer on your property and needing to move out will depend on a number of factors.  The average process will take between 8-16 weeks, but it can be quicker or slower depending on the parties in the chain, the type of property (for example a flat may take longer as extra information is needed from third parties such as the landlord/management company/managing agent) and any complications which may arise in any of the transactions throughout the chain. Our Residential Property Team will talk you through the procedure and likely timescales in more detail once the specifics of the sale and the chain are known.

You can view the stage of a usual property sale here.