Pre-contract enquiries are such an important part of the conveyancing process. These provide the answers to all of the questions your solicitor has asked of the vendor. In effect the answers, alongside your building surveyors report, give you your fact book on the property you are buying.
The main bulk of the conveyancing process is your solicitor finding the answers to these questions. This is so important because of the rule of ‘Caveat Emptor’, Let the Buyer Beware! You must do your own due diligence as once the contracts have been signed these problems become your responsibility. Therefore your solicitor is checking the facts.
Questions will be asked on service charge, maintenance of the building, planning permission, utilities, easements, covenants, boundaries and local area searches (along with anything else that may be relevant to that property).
Once your solicitor has received all of the responses they will draft a summary and recommendation report. You need to read this in detail. My advice is, sit down and spend some quality time soaking in the information. If you have any queries, raise it with your solicitor and see what they recommend and then consider if this recommendation works for you? In some cases you can insure against risks, in others there may be a price that would make the query OK for you, thus negotiate a discount on purchase price. Or the query may be unresolvable and something you don’t want to accommodate – in which case stop the sale, and that’s OK but just be vocal in what you want. Take your time over this process and make sure you are happy with the outcome.
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