Direct between buyer and vendor, bound by a deposit on the day, and carried from the memorandum to the register on one record: the searches, the legal pack, the solicitor's check, exchange, completion and registration, each step shown here as it happens.
The idea
One sale, one record, no chain of retyping
In an ordinary sale the agent takes the offer, writes a memorandum by hand, the two solicitors open files from it, the buyer's solicitor orders searches weeks later, papers cross in the post, and nothing binds anyone until exchange, months on. A large share of agreed sales in England and Wales fall through before exchange, most of them because someone changed their mind while nobody was bound and nothing was ready.
Homebinding turns that round. The vendor prepares the pack before marketing. The buyer makes the offer on the record. On acceptance the record writes the memorandum itself, both parties sign a reservation agreement and the buyer pays a deposit to a regulated stakeholder, so from that day the vendor has stopped marketing and the buyer has money on the table. Homebinding orders the searches on the same day and assembles the legal pack as they return. A solicitor on each side, regulated and insured, does the work the law reserves to them: checking the pack, advising their client, agreeing the contract, exchanging, completing and registering. The record shows every one of those steps to everyone in the sale, and it will not let a step happen until what it depends on is present.
The record moves through eleven stages. Three belong to the vendor before a buyer appears; eight run from the offer to registration. Each stage names who acts, what the record produces, and what must be true before the next stage opens. The same eleven stages run in England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Ireland; the words change where the law does, and those differences are set out lower down.
1
InstructionVendor and Homebinding
Identity verified to the HM Land Registry practice guide 81 standard. Official copies of the register and title plan obtained and read by the title parser, which turns every charge, restriction, notice and covenant into a plain English line with a note of what evidence will clear it. The vendor's solicitor is named. Asking price and reservation deposit percentage set.
Produces: title analysis; the vendor's file on the record.
2
Sale packVendor, vendor's solicitor, Homebinding
The vendor answers the sale pack questionnaire; the solicitor turns it into the property information form (TA6) and the fittings and contents form (TA10), with the leasehold form (TA7), the lease and management information where the title is leasehold. Planning permissions, building regulation certificates, guarantees and the energy performance certificate go on. The vendor's solicitor prepares the draft contract on the Standard Conditions of Sale. The record will not let the listing go live until the pack index is complete.
Produces: the sale pack, indexed, hashed and timestamped.
Produces: the listing; a register of everyone who has seen the pack.
4
OfferBuyer, then Homebinding, then vendor
The buyer completes the offer form: price, conditions, funding, chain, proposed dates, solicitor. Before it reaches the vendor Homebinding verifies the buyer's identity and proof of funds for the deposit under the Money Laundering Regulations 2017, and the decision in principle where there is a mortgage. The vendor accepts, counters or declines on the record. Nothing is binding yet, and the record says so.
Produces: the offer, and the buyer's verified position.
5
Memorandum of saleHomebinding
On acceptance the record generates the memorandum from the listing, the offer and the parties, and sends it to the buyer, the vendor and both solicitors at the same moment. There is no retyping and no wait for the agent to get round to it. Both solicitors open their files on the day.
Produces: the memorandum of sale.
6
Reservation and depositBuyer and vendor
Both parties sign the reservation agreement electronically on the record. The buyer pays the deposit, at the percentage the vendor set (1, 2.5 or 5 percent), to a regulated stakeholder. From the Signing Date the vendor stops marketing; the buyer's solicitor must be instructed the next working day, request the contract within 5 working days and exchange within 25. A buyer who withdraws without one of the listed causes loses the deposit; a vendor who withdraws returns it and pays the same again. Homebinding orders the searches on the Signing Date.
Produces: the signed reservation agreement, the deposit receipt, the clock.
7
Searches and the legal packHomebinding, vendor's solicitor, buyer's solicitor
The searches return to the record (the table below says what each one is). The vendor's solicitor adopts the draft contract. When every document and every search is present Homebinding issues the legal pack index. The buyer's solicitor checks the pack, raises enquiries on the record where the vendor's solicitor answers them, and reports on title to the buyer. The checking, the advice and the contract are reserved to an authorised person by the Legal Services Act 2007; Homebinding assembles, it does not advise.
Produces: the legal pack; the report on title.
8
Survey and mortgageBuyer, surveyor, lender
Runs alongside stage 7. The survey by the Named Surveyor goes on the record. If it reports defects costing more than the threshold set at signing, the buyer may renegotiate (a new memorandum is generated) or withdraw with the deposit returned. The lender's valuation and the mortgage offer go on the record when issued.
Produces: the survey; the mortgage offer.
9
ExchangeBoth solicitors
The record checks its list before it lets exchange happen: report on title, survey read, mortgage offer where needed, every restriction on the title cleared by a document rather than a promise, contract agreed, both solicitors holding instructions, the balance of the 10 percent deposit in the buyer's solicitor's client account, identity of both parties current, completion date fixed. Then the two solicitors exchange under Law Society Formula B, each holding a signed part of the contract. Section 2 of the Law of Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1989 is why it takes a signed written contract: from that telephone call both parties are bound.
Produces: the exchanged contract; the completion date.
10
CompletionBoth solicitors, the lender, the stakeholder
The buyer's solicitor obtains an official search with priority (OS1) at HM Land Registry, which freezes the register in the buyer's favour for 30 working days, draws the mortgage money on a certificate of title, and sends the balance by same day transfer. The vendor's solicitor confirms receipt, releases the keys, redeems the vendor's mortgage on an undertaking and hands over the signed transfer (TR1). The stakeholder applies the reservation deposit to the price. Homebinding never holds the purchase money.
Produces: the completion statement; the transfer.
11
RegistrationBuyer's solicitor
The Stamp Duty Land Tax return goes to HM Revenue and Customs within 14 days of completion under Part 4 of the Finance Act 2003 (Land Transaction Tax to the Welsh Revenue Authority within 30 days in Wales). The application to register (AP1, with the TR1, the tax certificate and the lender's charge) is lodged inside the priority period under the Land Registration Act 2002 and the Land Registration Rules 2003. When the register shows the buyer as proprietor, the record closes, and every document stays on it for the day the buyer sells.
Produces: the updated register; the closed record.
Searches
What Homebinding orders on the Signing Date, and what each one tells you
A search is a question put to a public register or a data holder about the property. In an ordinary sale the buyer's solicitor orders them after instruction, and they take from a few days to several weeks. Homebinding orders them the day the reservation is signed so that they are back before the legal pack is checked, and shows their status on the record. Each result is placed on the record as received; the solicitor reads it, Homebinding does not interpret it.
Search
Who answers it
What it shows
Good for
Official copies of the register and title plan
HM Land Registry
Who owns it, the plan, mortgages, restrictions, notices, covenants and rights. Read by the title parser at instruction and refreshed before exchange.
Refreshed before exchange
Local land charges (LLC1)
HM Land Registry's local land charges register, or the council where the register has not yet migrated, under the Local Land Charges Act 1975
Charges registered against the land: conditions on planning permissions, tree preservation orders, listed building status, conservation area, financial charges, smoke control
Usually accepted for six months
Local authority enquiries (CON29)
The local council
Planning history and applications, building regulation approvals and completion certificates, whether the road is adopted, enforcement notices, contaminated land, radon, road schemes nearby
Usually accepted for six months
Drainage and water (CON29DW)
The water and sewerage company
Mains water and drainage or not, where the sewers and mains run and whether any pass under the building, adoption of the sewers, whether the property is within the drainage boundary
Usually accepted for six months
Environmental
A search provider using Environment Agency, British Geological Survey and local authority data
Flood risk from rivers, sea, surface water and groundwater; contaminated land; ground stability and subsidence; radon; landfill; nearby energy and infrastructure projects
Past, present and planned mining, mine entries within 20 metres, subsidence claims, gas. Only where the property lies in a coalfield; the record knows from the postcode.
Usually accepted for six months
Chancel repair liability
A search provider
Whether the land may be liable to contribute to the repair of a parish church chancel. Where a risk exists, an insurance policy is the usual answer.
Against each buyer, required by the lender before it releases the mortgage money
Ordered just before exchange
Official search with priority (OS1)
HM Land Registry
A final check that nothing has changed on the register since the official copies, and 30 working days of priority in which the buyer can complete and register ahead of anyone else
Ordered just before completion
Wales
The same searches, ordered from the Welsh council and the Welsh water company, with the environmental report drawing on Natural Resources Wales flood data. The tax on the purchase is Land Transaction Tax under the Land Transaction Tax and Anti-avoidance of Devolved Taxes (Wales) Act 2017, paid to the Welsh Revenue Authority within 30 days of completion. Registration is at HM Land Registry as in England.
Scotland
The seller must publish a Home Report before marketing (single survey and valuation, energy report, property questionnaire) under Part 3 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 2006, and it must be no more than twelve weeks old when marketing starts. The buyer's solicitor obtains the Land Register title sheet and plan from Registers of Scotland, a legal report (searches of the Land Register and of the Register of Inhibitions against the seller), a plans report, a property enquiry certificate from the council (planning, building warrants and completion certificates, roads, water and drainage, contaminated land) and a Coal Authority report where relevant. Before settlement an advance notice on the Land Register protects the buyer for 35 days.
Northern Ireland
The folio and map from the Land Registry of Northern Ireland at Land and Property Services under the Land Registration Act (Northern Ireland) 1970, or a Registry of Deeds search for unregistered land; a property certificate from the council and the Department for Infrastructure (planning, building control, roads); a search of the Statutory Charges Register; an environmental and flood report; bankruptcy and judgments searches; and a priority search before completion. Stamp Duty Land Tax applies as in England.
Ireland
The folio and filed plan from Tailte Éireann under the Registration of Title Act 1964, or a memorial search in the Registry of Deeds; a planning search at the local authority; judgments, bankruptcy and, for a company vendor, Companies Registration Office searches, all brought down to the day of closing; and the Law Society of Ireland Requisitions on Title, the standard questions the buyer's solicitor puts to the vendor's. Stamp duty under the Stamp Duties Consolidation Act 1999 is returned to the Revenue Commissioners within 44 days.
The legal pack
What is in it
The legal pack is the sale pack the vendor prepared, plus the searches and the draft contract, indexed and issued to the buyer's solicitor in one piece. Each item carries a hash and a timestamp, so both solicitors can prove which version they read.
Official copies of the register and the title plan, with the plain English title analysis
Property information form (TA6) and fittings and contents form (TA10)
For leasehold: the lease, the leasehold information form (TA7) and the landlord's or managing agent's management pack (LPE1)
Planning permissions, building regulation completion certificates, listed building consents, guarantees and warranties held by the vendor, with a stated status for each: supplied, not applicable, or missing
Tenancy agreements, deposit protection certificates and notices where any part is let
The draft contract on the Standard Conditions of Sale, adopted by the vendor's solicitor
The searches, as received
The pack index and certificate of completeness, issued by Homebinding
The solicitor's check
What only a solicitor may do, and what the record does
Preparing the contract and the transfer, and applying to register, are reserved instrument activities under section 12 and Schedule 2 of the Legal Services Act 2007. Advising a buyer whether to buy on the title is legal advice. Homebinding does neither. Each party has their own solicitor or licensed conveyancer, regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority or the Council for Licensed Conveyancers, insured, and holding client money under their accounts rules.
The buyer's solicitor reads the title and the searches, raises enquiries, reports on title to the buyer and certifies title to the lender. The vendor's solicitor answers enquiries, agrees the contract and gives the undertakings on completion. What the record adds is that every one of these steps is visible to the four people in the sale, and the record refuses to move when a step is missing. Five things stop it outright:
A restriction on the register with no consent, certificate or lodged cancellation on the record to clear it. A promise that it will be dealt with is not evidence.
An incomplete pack: the listing cannot go live without it.
Identity of either party unverified or expired at exchange or completion.
No priority search, or a priority period that has run out, at completion or registration.
A new entry on the register since the pack was issued that the buyer's solicitor has not marked reviewed.
Exchange, completion, registration
The last three steps, in plain words
Exchange
Two identical contracts, one signed by each party, held by their solicitors. On the telephone, under the Law Society's Formula B, each solicitor undertakes to send their part, and the moment they agree the time, both parties are bound and the completion date is fixed. The deposit, normally 10 percent under the Standard Conditions, is held by the vendor's solicitor as stakeholder; the reservation deposit already paid counts towards it. In Scotland the same point is the conclusion of missives, an exchange of letters between the solicitors under the Requirements of Writing (Scotland) Act 1995, and in Ireland it is the exchange of signed Contracts for Sale under the Land and Conveyancing Law Reform Act 2009.
Completion
The day the money and the keys change hands. The buyer's solicitor sends the balance by CHAPS; when it lands the vendor's solicitor telephones to confirm, the keys are released, and the vendor's mortgage is paid off from the proceeds on the vendor's solicitor's undertaking. The transfer deed (TR1) passes to the buyer's solicitor. In Scotland it is settlement, with the disposition; in Ireland it is closing, with the deed of transfer and the closing searches done that morning.
Registration
Ownership in England and Wales changes on the register, not on the deed, so the buyer's solicitor lodges the AP1 with the TR1, the tax certificate and the lender's charge inside the 30 working day priority period from the OS1. HM Land Registry updates the register and the buyer is proprietor. Scotland registers the disposition in the Land Register under the Land Registration etc. (Scotland) Act 2012; Northern Ireland at the Land Registry of Northern Ireland; Ireland at Tailte Éireann. The tax comes first everywhere: SDLT within 14 days, LTT and LBTT within 30, Irish stamp duty within 44.
Who does what
Four people, one record
Who
Does
Does not
Homebinding
Verifies identity and funds; generates the memorandum, the reservation agreement, the pack index and the statements; orders the searches; holds the reservation deposit through a regulated stakeholder; keeps the record and enforces its stops; is a member of a government approved redress scheme under the Estate Agents Act 1979 (The Property Ombudsman)
Give legal advice; prepare the contract or the transfer; hold the purchase money; apply to register
The vendor
Answers the questionnaire truthfully; supplies the documents; signs the reservation, the contract and the transfer; gives vacant possession or the tenancies as stated
Market to anyone else during the reservation period
The buyer
Makes the offer; proves identity and funds; signs the reservation and pays the deposit; instructs a solicitor the next working day; reads the survey; signs the contract; pays the balance and the tax
Withdraw without one of the listed causes and keep the deposit
The two solicitors
Everything the law reserves: the title check, the enquiries, the report on title, the contract, exchange, the undertakings, completion, the tax return, registration
Wait for the post: the pack, the searches and the enquiries are on the record on day one
This page describes the process Homebinding runs. It is not legal advice; the solicitor acting for you advises on your sale. Working day and priority periods are as published by HM Land Registry and the tax authorities named on the pages linked above, each of which is read in full on Homebinding.
