Solicitors Fees

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Hi, I know this will vary but on average how much can I expect to pay to 1) buy a house and 2) to sell our existing home. We might not do everything at once. Thanks.
 
Someone must have an idea how much it costs? No??
 
There are standard amounts laid out by the Law Society. Solicitor should give you a quote as well. I had a 3.5k quote and ended up payiing 2k to a diff solicitor. There are standard fees you pay re registration etc and the solictor includes them in their charge as well.
 
It is a free market i would shop around a few solicitors u would believe the difference in prices alot of solicitors are still working on a percentage of the sell price/ purchase price which is very unfair..

i wouldnt pay more than 1000e to purchase and if ur doing two together id be looking for a very reasonable price.
 

This is nonsense. There is precious little conveyancing priced as a proportion or percentage of a price. Auctioneers yes, solicitors no.

Conveyancing has become even more difficult in recent times as the price of property collapses, the banks are not lending and the clients are stretched and stressed. 1000e is a low price and for that you should expect no advice or assistance with the transaction.

2K for a sale and purchase is frankly rubbish. If you pay peanuts.............

The very best advice for anyone looking for a solicitor is :

(1) Ask for recommendations from friends, family and colleagues as regards efficiency, ease to deal with, availability when the wheels come off and price.
(2) Call these people and ask for a fee quote. Tell the whole story - not just the easy bits.

Decide who you would best like to deal with - price should not be a major consideration.

I think the days of cheap conveyancing are gone and I welcome that - solicitors professional indemnity is going through the roof as the rash of cheap deals unravels.

mf
 


I am a legal executive and any conveyancing that comes into our north county dublin office is priced by the managing partner like that so i am speaking from personal experience here.
 
Hi Mrs. Doyle

It may well be that this is how some law offices ( including yours) price business. However, it is also true that many solicitors offices are shutting down or are in serious financial bother. In fact, I think you alluded to this yourself recently:

http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?p=954308#post954308

In an environment where property transactions ( certainly those involving mortgages) are going to become slower, harder and generally more labour intensive, and where overheads are increasing heavily ( esp. insurance) the days of the 'cheap' conveyancing deal are certainly numbered.

This is unfortunate for the consumer - but from a practicing lawyer's perspective, it is much preferable to continuing to pay for the avalanche of problems we are at present facing in the legal profession due to a few cowboys having been able to unacceptably lower their standards during the boom.

I should say that it is of course possible to run a solicitor's office properly, do the work properly, make a profit and still charge very low conveyancing fees. It is just that it is very difficult to do - even in a boom - and obviously impossible to do if the volume of work isn't actually there ( as is the case now)
 
Hi,
We just bought a house and our solicitor charged €1650 and we had priced around for a while as each solicitor had different fees.
 
Hi I've been shopping around for solicitor quotes and the cheapest so far has been 1900euros , is this good ? I dont want to trapse across Dublin to see my solicitor so Ive shopped locally so far .
The property is a new build and Im a first time buyer .
 
We shopped around too...varying quotes-the cheapest was €1600- this was for a solicitor based locally too....I think a recommendation from friends is useful- we got a couple of recommendations but the fees were quite high when we got quotes..presume conveyancing is a fairly straightforward bread and butter job for solicitors so we weren't overly concerned about going for a cheaper quote.
In fact I think solicitors are looking for business and some areprepared to be realistic in todays market
 
I suspect that the €1600 and €1900 figures quoted in the last two posts are both total sums for Fee+VAT+Outlay.

€1900 is very good value for Fee=VAT+Outlay on a new house purchase with a Land Registry Title. The Fee element would be circa €1,000 -1,100.

€1600 sounds a little too cheap for such a purchase - so I am assuming that it is either a sale or a "Registry of Deeds" title, either of which of which would involve lower outlays. Again, it seems like very good value. The Fee element would be circa €1,150 -€1,200.

The only way to compare like with like when getting a quote from a solicitor is:

A. Insist that the solicitor quote an all-in figure for everything and stand over it. This gives certainty but may cost a little more OR

B. Get quotes on a "FEE+VAT+Outlay" basis, and compare the fee element only. This is the best way to ensure that you are getting value AND comparing like with like.
 
Thanks MOB - yes my quote was all inclusive
Basic fee of 1000 + VAT + all outlays = 1970 euros.
And its from a firm my family have used previously .

The other quotes had basis fees of 1200 plus + VAT + outlays.
 
hi, the €1600 was total including VAT, fees and any outlays...although it probably is registry of deeds rather than land registry. The solicitor we got explained this to us. Others who gave us higher quotes weren't so straight-one solicitor told us this would cost circa €500 and neglected to mention the difference in cost between the two though knowing from our location that it was probably the lower cost of registry of deeds....
It is a good/cheap quote- all well so far....if it was for something else I would be more concerned about sourcing a very good solicitor but as I said we're presuming most solicitors can manage the purchase of a house...
 
rosey said:
It is a good/cheap quote- all well so far....if it was for something else I would be more concerned about sourcing a very good solicitor but as I said we're presuming most solicitors can manage the purchase of a house...
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I'm not a solicitor, but I've bought and sold a few properties in my time, and been an interested party in a lot more such transactions. I would say that it's HUGELY important to source a good solicitor for a property transaction. How many other transactions will you be involved with that involve hundreds of thousands of euros?

A few quick examples off the top of my head: -

  • A good solicitor will explain the various legal documents you're signing; a bad one will shove them in front of your face and say "sign here".
  • A good solicitor will take a lot of time examining the title of the property you're planning to buy. If you buy a property with faulty title because a bad solicitor never noticed, it could cause no end of headache for you if you want to sell on.
  • A good solicitor will not cause delays to your transaction.
I'm sure some of the solicitors who post here will expand on this with further examples of things they do that I've missed.

By the way - a good solicitor doesn't have to mean an expensive solicitor.
 
LDFerguson said:
If you buy a property with faulty title because a bad solicitor never noticed, it could cause no end of headache for you if you want to sell on.
  • A good solicitor will not cause delays to your transaction.
.
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Consumers should expect the above service as of right in any property transaction they hire a solicitor for. That's why they mere ignorant purchasers hire the regulated, indemnified professionals.
 
I presume you're making a point with your reference to "ignorant purchasers" but I don't know what your point is.

One reason people hire solicitors for property purchases is that for the vast majority of transactions in this country, they have no choice.

You should expect good service as a matter of course from everyone you hire. But as there are human beings involved, standards vary in every profession.
 
I just mean ordinary people who know nothing about conveyancing. They should expect that a conveyance will be carried out properly and in a timely manner that's all. I don't think that's a big ask. That one is risking something going wrong in this simple process by hiring a regulated professional means something is wrong with the way conveyancing is done in too many cases.
 
Bronte said:
That one is risking something going wrong in this simple process by hiring a regulated professional means something is wrong with the way conveyancing is done in too many cases.
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I think you are quite right. People should expect and receive a professional service, well executed.

The only place I disagree with you is that it is a 'simple process'. Sadly, quite a bit of the time, it is anything but simple.

Title can be horrendous. The law changes. Practice changes.
 
Vanilla said:
The only place I disagree with you is that it is a 'simple process'. Sadly, quite a bit of the time, it is anything but simple.

Title can be horrendous. .
Click to expand...

And I wonder why the title is horrendous in many cases.
 
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