You’ve had your offer on a new property accepted. Congratulations. Now everyone tells you it’ll take around twelve weeks to complete and to be patient. But nobody really explains what’s happening during those twelve weeks, why it sometimes takes longer, or what you can do to help things move along.
Firstly, it’s worth noting that no two transactions are the same. A straightforward purchase of a freehold property with no chain can complete in six to eight weeks. A leasehold flat in a long chain with a slow-moving lender at the other end can take six months. The timeline below reflects a fairly typical transaction for you to use as a guide.
Week 1: Instructing your conveyancer and getting started
Once your offer is accepted, the estate agent will ask for your conveyancer’s details so they can issue a memorandum of sale – a document confirming the agreed price, the parties involved and the property address. This formally kicks the process off.
At the same time, your conveyancer will send you a client care letter, terms of engagement and an initial questionnaire asking for information about yourself and the purchase. Returning this promptly matters more than most buyers realise – your conveyancer cannot start work until identity checks are complete and paperwork is returned.
If you’re buying with a mortgage, your lender will also instruct a solicitor to act on their behalf – usually your own conveyancer, who acts for both you and the lender in most residential transactions.
At this stage you will need to gather your proof of funds and explain your source of wealth. Simply, we need to see evidence that you have the funds but also proof of how you got the money and not just showing us what you have in the bank.
Weeks 2 to 3: Draft contract and initial documents
Your conveyancer will review the title documents and identify any issues with how the property is owned, and any restrictions or obligations that attach to it. This is where the quality of your conveyancer starts to make a real difference.
A thorough review of the title can reveal matters that significantly affect the value or usability of the property, such as restrictive covenants that limit what you can do with it, rights of way that allow others access across it, easements affecting drainage or services, or defects in how ownership has been transferred in the past. Some of these can be resolved or insured against. Others are more serious.
Things your conveyancer should be looking out for:
- Restrictive covenants that prevent extensions, commercial use or alterations – relevant if your plans for the property depend on doing any of these
- Missing planning permissions or building regulations sign-off for previous works, which can create problems when you come to sell or make a claim on insurance
- Boundary discrepancies between what the title plan shows and what exists on the ground — a particular issue where extensions or garden alterations have taken place
- Informal arrangements that have never been properly documented, such as shared access or maintenance obligations with neighbouring properties
The property information form completed by the seller is self-reported – the seller answers questions, but a conveyancer relying solely on those answers without scrutinising the underlying documents is not doing the full job. Good conveyancing means reading what’s actually there, not just accepting what has been declared.
Be wary of choosing a conveyancer solely on price – the risk with this tends to surface later – when you want to extend, when you come to sell, or when a dispute arises with a neighbour and the title is less clear than it should have been. By that point, the saving on legal fees at the outset looks considerably less attractive.
Weeks 3 to 5: Searches
Your conveyancer will apply for searches on your behalf. The standard searches for most residential purchases are:
- Local authority search – covers planning permissions, enforcement notices, road adoption and other matters held by the council
- Water and drainage search – confirms whether the property is connected to mains water and drainage and whether any public sewers run through the land
- Environmental search – checks for flood risk, ground contamination and other environmental factors
Depending on the location and type of property, additional searches may be recommended – a coal mining search, and highway searches specific to the area.
Search turnaround times vary considerably. Local authority searches in particular can take anywhere from a few days to several weeks depending on the council. This is one of the main reasons transactions take longer than buyers expect, and it is largely outside anyone’s control.
Weeks 4 to 6: Mortgage offer and enquiries
While searches are underway, two other things are happening in parallel.
First, your lender will carry out a valuation of the property and, if satisfied, issue a formal mortgage offer. Your conveyancer will review the offer conditions and report to you on anything that requires your attention.
Second, your conveyancer will be raising enquiries with the seller’s solicitor – questions arising from the title documents, the property information form or anything that needs clarification before contracts can be exchanged. Some enquiries are resolved quickly. Others, particularly those involving missing planning consents, defective title or lease-related matters, can take considerably longer and occasionally require specialist insurance to resolve.
This stage is often where transactions slow down. Enquiries that aren’t answered promptly, or that reveal something requiring further investigation, can add weeks to the process. Neither side’s solicitor controls how quickly the other responds.
Weeks 6 to 8: Report on title and signing contracts
Once searches are back, enquiries are resolved and the mortgage offer is in place, your conveyancer will prepare a report on title. This is a formal summary of everything relevant to the purchase – the title, the search results, the mortgage conditions, the contract terms and any matters you need to be aware of before you commit.
You’ll be asked to sign the contract and the mortgage deed and to transfer your deposit (typically ten percent of the purchase price though this can sometimes be negotiated) ready for exchange.
Exchange of contracts
Exchange is the point at which the transaction becomes legally binding. Until exchange, either party can withdraw without penalty. After exchange, neither can – and if you pull out you risk losing your deposit.
On exchange, a completion date is agreed. This is the date you will get the keys.
If you’re in a chain, all parties in the chain exchange simultaneously. This is coordinated between multiple sets of solicitors and can sometimes take longer to arrange than expected, particularly where the chain is long or one party is not ready.
Between exchange and completion
Your conveyancer will carry out final pre-completion searches, prepare a completion statement setting out the exact funds required and send a certificate of title to your lender requesting the mortgage funds.
You’ll need to transfer the balance of the purchase price – the remaining funds after your deposit – to your conveyancer in time for completion. Make sure you know exactly how much is needed and when, as delays in funds arriving can delay completion.
Completion day
On completion day, your conveyancer sends the purchase funds to the seller’s conveyancer. Once received and confirmed, the seller’s solicitor authorises release of the keys, usually via the estate agent.
After completion, your conveyancer will deal with the remaining formalities: paying Stamp Duty Land Tax (England) Land Transaction Tax (Wales) on your behalf and registering your ownership at HM Land Registry. Registration can take several weeks or months depending on Land Registry workloads, but this doesn’t affect your ownership – you own the property from the moment completion occurs.
Why does it take so long?
The honest answer is that conveyancing involves multiple parties – buyer, seller, lender, estate agent, search providers, and often multiple sets of solicitors in a chain – none of whom control each other’s timelines. A transaction moves at the pace of its slowest part.
What you can do is make sure your own side moves quickly: return paperwork promptly, respond to queries without delay, have your deposit funds ready in good time and stay in regular contact with your conveyancer. It won’t speed up the searches or the other side’s enquiries, but it ensures your solicitor is never waiting on you.
If you’re planning on buying or selling a property and would like to discuss how we can help, please get in touch with our conveyancing team.
