Lawyer Checker Gives Cricket Without Boundaries Charity A Donation Boost
Lawyer Checker matched their employee, Tom Lyes’ fundraising efforts after reaching £250 for UK registered charity, Cricket Without Boundaries. After hearing about Tom’s cause for such a worthy charity, risk management provider, Lawyer Checker wanted to commend his hard work by boosting his donations to £500 with an additional company donation of £250. Key Relationship […]
Estate Agents Must Operate Transparently To Consumers Regarding Referral Fees
Heather Wheeler, Minister for Housing and Homelessness, outlined the government’s position on referral fees and new housing reforms at the Council for Licensed Conveyancers annual conference. Whilst delivering a talk at the CLC conference, Mrs Wheeler told delegates that she is “concerned with the lack of transparency” around referral fees. Following the National Trading Standards Estate […]
Holistically Shared Data Sources Will Solve Housing Problems
Improved data and technology have been identified as the key ingredients to improve consumer confidence in the housing market, reduce fraud and ensure the efficient and timely turn around on housing completions. Whilst on the Home Buying Panel at the Council of Licensed Conveyancers’ annual conference, Mike Harlow, acting chief executive of HM Land Registry […]
Lawyer Checker And Legal Ombudsman Joins Forces To Help Reduce Cybercrime
Lawyer Checker are collaborating with Legal Ombudsman to help protect law firms through an interactive webinar about how best to protect themselves from cybercrime and what to do if you are a victim to a cyberattack. The Society of Trust & Estate Practitioners (STEP) predicted the cost of probate fraud at £150 million – stating […]
CLC Conference Round Up – Referral Fees, Reservation Agreements And Modern Methods Of Construction
The Council Of Licensed Conveyancers Annual Conference 2019 seemed to have found the perfect location to reflect the political uncertainty, with the choppy, murky and unsettled river Thames below providing a perfect opaque reflection of the year ahead. Despite the political turmoil bubbling across the river, the beautiful ETC Venues building was packed full of […]
Conveyancing Assistant, Mark Stocker Wins InfoTrack’s Trip Of A Lifetime To Australia
Conveyancing assistant, Mark Stocker of law firm Stephen Rimmer LLP has won a trip to Australia after being drawn as the lucky winner in InfoTrack’s Take me to Australia promotion. InfoTrack users were invited to take part in a live draw held by webinar on Tuesday 15th January, where Marks name was drawn at random. […]
Significant Decreases In December’s Property Transactions
The Office for National Statistics has found that the property market suffered a significant decrease in property transactions in December. The provisional seasonally adjusted UK property transaction count for December was 102,330 residential properties and 11,230 non-residential properties. In terms of seasonally adjusted data, this marks a 0.1% decrease on the month before. However, when […]
Housing Court Could Improve Dispute Resolution Times
As the Tenants Fees Bill made its way through Parliament in 2018, the government also proposed a housing court specializing in housing disputes. It is thought that the court would focus on a myriad of issues from repossessions through to rental issues like rent arrear problems or unacceptable standards of rental property. In November, a […]
Welsh House Prices Peaked At The End of 2018
In December 2018, house prices in Wales surpassed themselves and reached an all-time peak by taking the average price across the UK to £186,699 according to the latest quarterly index. Looking at the fourth quarter of the year, Principality Building Society confirmed the new peak is £2,000 higher than the previous highest average in September […]
Digital Solutions Continue To Reduce Conveyancing Timescales
With the average conveyancing transaction taking 14 weeks to complete in 2018, many firms have been looking at innovative ways of creating a more efficient and inclusive process for the consumer. One way to achieve this has been through using a range of technological solutions to create a more fluent digital process. In recent weeks, […]
Potential Shift Away From Leasehold Property And Improved Conditions For Leaseholders
Sometimes in this industry you feel like you’re at the start of a journey towards change, however most of the time the end point and goal appears to be a long way in the future. It’s rare however for that change to be within touching distance however when it comes to the leasehold reform I […]
Brexit Cast A Shadow Over The UK Property Market, Leaving The Market Flattened
Search Acumen comments on HMRC’s Monthly Property Transactions for December Andy Sommerville, Director of Search Acumen, comments: “Brexit clearly cast a shadow over the UK property market in the run-up to Christmas, leaving the market flattened as a result. It’s likely the same shadow will extend into January once the first 2019 indicators emerge. “Uncertainty […]
Geovation Programme Returns For 2019 To Help Start-Ups Break Through
GeoTech and PropTech start-ups get the chance to advance their businesses after Geovation announced the return of its Accelerator Programme for 2019. The application process has opened for the Programme, which is based at Geovation’s Hub in Clerkenwell, London. The Accelerator Programme offers numerous advantages for GeoTech and PropTech start-ups. It puts people in touch […]
Inexpensive Deals and Schemes Helps More First Time Buyers
An array of more competitive deals and schemes, along with the Government’s Help to Buy Scheme which started back in 2013, have been boosting more first time buyers onto the property ladder in the UK – according to the latest mortgage lending figures The latest mortgage trends update report from the UK Finance shows that […]
What Lies Ahead For Conveyancing In 2019?
Buying and selling property and land may be an unchanging fixture in the lives of millions, but the conveyancing process will continue to evolve in the coming months. At Searches UK, we look at some big changes the legal industry can expect to embrace in 2019. Embracing price transparency New rules on price transparency were […]
Introducer Spotlight – The Moving Hub And Move Home Group
Every month we are intending to interview one major introducer of work to conveyancers to understand their business, what they want from conveyancers and what frustrates them. This is the first in the series. If you introduce work to conveyancers and want to be interviewed, we’d be keen to talk. The last calendar year ended […]
The Daily Deceit In The Home Buying And Selling Process
We only have to watch the news for a short amount of time to understand that the world is full of lies and deceit. This is not always a bad thing; I will always wax lyrical about my wife’s outfit choice for the day, even if her jumper resembles Harry Potter’s favourite house elf’s smock. […]
Lawyer Fined For Failing To Identify Panama Paper Clients’ PEP Status
A London lawyer, whose clients were linked to the Panama Paper scandal, has been fined by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT). Khalid Mohammed Sharif, partner at Westminster private client firm, Child & Child, was fined £45,000 for failing to carry out adequate due diligence on wealthy foreign clients that were politically exposed persons (PEPs). Additionally, […]
SureMove Increase Social Media And Digital Presence
SureMove is embracing the future and bravely venturing into the digital world of social media. When such a large section of the population utilise digital platforms every day, we found it necessary to improve our customer experience by providing communication platforms we all increasingly demand. With that in mind, we would like to unveil our […]
Is Human Error The Biggest Cyber Risk?
What is your firm doing to combat cybercrime? The chances are it’s investing in security technology, tightening up information security policies and – in case the worst happens – considering cyber insurance. But what are you doing about your people? Many firms will be publishing cybersecurity policies to circulate to staff and providing some form […]
