Residential Conveyancing

Our Service and Experience in Dealing with Residential Property

Residential Conveyancing is a specialism of Martin Tolhurst and we act on around 7000 property completions a year. According to the Land Registry, we are one of the largest firms of solicitors in the country, undertaking conveyancing. We have more than 30 specialist fee earners dealing with residential property work who would be happy to act on your behalf. For individual fee earner’s biographies, please see the individual links below.

We act on behalf of clients selling and buying and are also on the panel of all major mortgage lenders to ensure that we can act on behalf of your mortgage lender in your sale/purchase transaction. This should save you both time and cost.

A Quality, Award Winning, Conveyancing Service.

As evidence of the quality of service that you will receive, we have won multiple awards for our conveyancing services. In 2024, we were judged to be the best firm in the South of England for conveyancing. In 2021 we won the Conveyancing Training award nationally at the Modern Law conveyancing Awards, and in 2022 we won the Law Net Training and Development awards.

Rated by Our Clients

In 2023 over 300 clients completed surveys/reviews for the service that they had received from us on residential conveyancing transactions and 94% of our clients in those surveys confirmed that they would use us again or recommend us to their family/friends. Our review website scores (all as at 1st January 2025 and subject to change) are also very high for the conveyancing industry:

Review Solicitors 4.7*/5

Facebook 4.7*/5

Yell.com 4.6*/5

Google Reviews 4.5*/5

Trustpilot 4.5*/5

Who will deal with your matter?

Your transaction will be dealt with by a named contact at the firm, and this will be one of the conveyancing specialists employed by Martin Tolhurst. We have over 30 specialist conveyancers in Residential Conveyancing; they will deal with your transaction from the time the file is opened, until completion takes place.

Typical Timescales

Every transaction will differ according to the extent of the chain, whether parties within the chain require a mortgage or a survey, and how quickly mortgage, survey and searches can be obtained. On a freehold transaction, we would anticipate exchange of contracts on average, to be 10–12 weeks from receipt or issuing of contracts until exchange of contracts. Your individual transaction may be more or less than this average. Completion is usually 5–14 days after exchange. On leasehold transactions, because of the involvement of management companies and landlords, an additional 2 weeks is required, giving an average of 12–14 weeks from receipt of contracts to exchange of contracts.

Key Stages

To see the key stages in a residential sale or purchase transaction, please click here.

Our Price Estimate- an exact estimate is available through our calculator.

We charge all clients fees based on a scale according to property price. In addition to price, there are other factors that determine the fees that will be charged including whether a mortgage is being obtained, if the property is freehold or leasehold, the number of buyers and other variables. We are able to give you a fixed estimate at the outset of the transaction once we have details of your proposed transaction. It is easily obtained by inputting the sale/purchase price, and a number of sellers/buyers on our conveyancing calculator tool which can be accessed here.

What is Included in Our Fees Estimate?

Included in the fixed fee transaction prices are the following: -

On a sale – the fee given includes all attendances and correspondence with you from the opening of the file until the file is closed shortly after completion, dealing with estate agents (if any), issuing of contracts, dealing with enquiries raised by the buyers and their solicitors, dealing with any mortgage company and redeeming the mortgage upon completion, dealing with the transfer documents, replies to requisitions and effecting exchange/completion and all associated documentation.

On a purchase transaction, the quotation provided includes all correspondence with you and all telephone calls and attendances with you during the transaction, dealing with the sellers’ solicitors, raising enquiries, considering replies to enquiries, raising searches, checking search replies, providing you with copies of the searches and replies to enquiries and any comments on the same, reporting to you and dealing with any mortgage offer/instructions, reporting to you on the same, arranging your signature with advice on the contract, transfer and mortgage effecting exchange, dealing with post-exchange work, including pre-completion searches, dealing with completion, and dealing with land registration matters and advising you of registration.

Factors that could increase or decrease our overall costs estimate

If a lease extension is required or a Deed of Variation to your lease because of an issue within the lease that would involve a formal deed with the landlord/managing agents, then an additional fee with apply. This would usually be around £800 plus VAT but will depend on individual circumstances.
If you are purchasing a property and your mortgage lender wishes to instruct separate solicitors with whom we have to deal, this would normally involve a great deal more administration. The additional cost is likely to be £150.
If you are obtaining a help to buy mortgage (by way of second charge on the property) or a help to buy ISA then an additional fee will be payable by you as the buyer. This would usually be £150 (second charge) or £50 (help to buy ISA).
You are selling and have more than one mortgage/loan to redeem upon completion of the sale or you are purchasing and are taking out more than one mortgage/loan to assist you with the purchase (£150 per loan).
If a title defect becomes evident during the transaction and needs to be remedied for example, a crucial right of way is not shown on the title to the property or on a leasehold flat the ground rent is excessive. The cost will depend on the remedy and documentation required and the likely cost will be £100–£900 depending on the issue.
A Declaration of Trust: if you are purchasing a property in joint names and wish to hold the property as tenants in common in unequal shares, then a Declaration of Trust would be recommended. This will confirm the arrangements for the sums put into the equity in the property, and what is to happen upon any sale or transfer of the property in the future. The complexity of the Declaration of Trust will depend on the individual circumstances as will the costs. The cost of a Declaration of Trust starts at £500 + VAT.

Regulated, Accredited and Insured for Peace of Mind.

As solicitors, we are regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, and observe the SRA Code of Conduct 2019. We have accreditations from the Law Society- we were awarded their Conveyancing Quality Standard in 2012 and have had annual reassessments since that date. We were awarded the quality management standard, Lexcel, in 2010 and have been reassessed annually since that date to retain the mark that only 1000 firms in the England Wales have been awarded. We are insured with an industry-leading insurer, Inter Hannover, who comprehensively insure us for claims up to £10 million. We operate an established complaints procedure.

Our Terms of Business and Terms and Conditions

All of the above information is designed to give you a fair and reasonable assessment of the likely costs and individual quotation will be given to you at the outset of your transaction and this may be adjusted according to the circumstances of your proposed sale or purchase. All of the above information is given by way of guidance and is not binding in terms of the individual transactional or quotation. If you have any queries about the price or service that may be provided on your transaction, please do not hesitate to contact the following conveyancing partners:

Abdul Mutallib (Head of Department) - amutallib@martintolhurst.co.uk - 01233 505571

Richard Carter (COLP) - rcarter@martintolhurst.co.uk - 01233 505558

Nameeta Gujral (Complaints Partner) - ngujral@martintolhurst.co.uk - 01795 416958

Tom Bexhell (Conveyancing Partner) - tbexhell@martintolhurst.co.uk - 01233 505568

Danny Ball (Conveyancing Partner) - dball@martintolhurst.co.uk - 01795 416932

For a copy of our Terms of Business or privacy policy please do not hesitate to contact us. If you require an individual price estimate for your residential conveyancing transaction, please contact us further so that we may provide this to you on an individual basis.

All of the above prices are subject to the rate of VAT that is charged, which is currently 20%. All of the above prices and VAT are subject to change at short notice.