Choosing a conveyancer is one of the first decisions a buyer or seller makes after agreeing a sale, and quite often it's made in about five minutes. Three quotes come back, one is £300 cheaper than the others, and that's the one that gets instructed.
And it's easy to see why. Conveyancing isn't something most people buy very often, and from the outside it's difficult to know what separates one firm from another. If they all appear to be doing the same legal work, price feels like the obvious way to compare them.
From an agent's point of view, though, you see the difference very quickly. Some conveyancers are responsive, keep their clients informed and deal with things as they come in. Others can take days to respond to relatively simple questions, and once that happens repeatedly across a transaction, progress becomes much harder than it needs to be.
So when a buyer or seller asks who they should use, there are a few things we'd encourage them to consider beyond the quote.
Price matters, but so does service
There is nothing wrong with comparing conveyancing fees. The cheapest quote isn't automatically the worst and the most expensive firm certainly isn't guaranteed to be the best.
What matters is helping the client understand what they're getting for the fee.
Some firms operate at high volume, with much of the process handled through online portals and larger teams. Others offer a more traditional service with a named conveyancer and more direct contact. Neither model is inherently wrong, but they can feel very different when you're halfway through a sale and need an answer to something.
Before a client chooses purely on a saving of a few hundred pounds, it's worth encouraging them to find out how the firm actually works. If they're comfortable managing most things through a portal, a more online service may suit them perfectly. If they know they'll want to speak directly to somebody throughout the transaction, they need to make sure that's the service they're actually buying.
Find out who will handle the file
One of the simplest questions you can suggest a client asks is: who will actually be dealing with my sale or purchase?
Ideally, there should be a named person responsible for the transaction, even if other members of the team help with parts of it.
It's also worth finding out what happens when that person is away. Property transactions don't stop because somebody goes on annual leave, and good firms will have a clear way of covering files in their absence.
The client doesn't necessarily need access to the same solicitor every time they make contact, but they should know who is responsible for their transaction and how to reach somebody who can actually help when needed.
Ask how they communicate
This sounds like a small thing at the beginning of a transaction. A few weeks later, it can become quite important.
Encourage buyers and sellers to ask whether communication is primarily by email, telephone or through an online portal. Will they have a direct email address? Can they speak to the person handling the file if something needs discussing?
There isn't one correct answer here. Plenty of buyers and sellers prefer having everything available through an online portal, while others would rather pick up the phone and speak to somebody.
The important thing is that they choose a firm whose way of working suits them.
Ask about current capacity
Conveyancers are busy. That's the nature of residential property, particularly when the market is active.
It's perfectly reasonable for a prospective client to ask whether the firm currently has capacity to take on the transaction. We wouldn't suggest interrogating them about an exact number of files or deciding that a particular caseload is automatically too high; different firms structure their teams in very different ways.
A more useful question might simply be:
"Do you currently have capacity to take this on, and what sort of response times should I expect once the transaction is underway?"
How they answer will probably tell the client more than the number itself.
Five questions worth giving your clients
If a buyer or seller is comparing a few conveyancers, we'd suggest they ask each of them broadly the same questions:
- Who will be responsible for my transaction? Find out whether they'll have a named conveyancer and who covers the file when they're unavailable.
- How will I communicate with you? Ask whether they'll have direct email and telephone contact or whether communication mainly takes place through a portal.
- What response times should I expect? Nobody needs a guarantee that every email will be answered immediately, but it's useful to understand what the firm's normal service looks like.
- Do you currently have capacity to take this on? A good firm should be comfortable explaining how their team manages its workload.
- Is there anything about my transaction that requires particular experience? Leasehold properties, shared ownership, listed buildings, new builds and more complicated chains can all bring additional work. If there's something unusual about the transaction, ask whether the firm regularly deals with it.
Those five questions will usually tell a client considerably more than comparing quotes alone.
Recommendations are useful too
If you've dealt with a conveyancer repeatedly and know how they work, that experience can be genuinely useful to a buyer or seller choosing who to instruct.
It doesn't mean they have to use your recommendation, and clients should always make their own choice, but first-hand experience of how somebody communicates and handles transactions is useful information.
There is also an important difference between recommending a firm because there's a commercial arrangement in place and recommending somebody because you've completed dozens of transactions with them and know how they work. If you're making a recommendation, be clear about which it is.
Once they're instructed, good chasing matters
Choosing a good conveyancer doesn't mean the transaction will progress itself. There will still be searches, enquiries, mortgage requirements, management packs and all the other things that make up a property transaction.
How those things are chased matters.
A generic email asking "Any update?" isn't particularly helpful. The person receiving it has to open the file, work out what you're referring to and then decide what information to give you.
A specific question is much easier to deal with:
"Have you now received the management pack from the managing agent?"
Or:
"Have the replies to the outstanding enquiries been reviewed, and are there any further enquiries to raise?"
The easier you make it for somebody to answer the question, the more useful the answer tends to be.
Relationships matter as well. If you're regularly dealing with the same local firms, getting to know the people behind the email addresses makes a difference. Conveyancers and agents are ultimately trying to achieve the same thing: get the transaction through while looking after their respective clients.
What your pipeline can tell you
There's another side to conveyancer choice that agencies haven't traditionally had much visibility over.
Over enough transactions, patterns start to emerge. Which firms tend to respond quickly? Where do files regularly sit for longer? Which conveyancers are particularly good with leasehold transactions? Which firms communicate well with clients?
Historically, most of that knowledge has lived in people's heads.
One negotiator knows that a particular solicitor is excellent. Another remembers that the last three files with a certain firm were difficult. Somebody leaves the branch and some of that knowledge disappears with them.
That's something we're particularly interested in measuring through TSP. If every chase, response and milestone is already being recorded against the transaction, you can start building a much clearer picture of how sales actually progress across different firms.
Not to produce a league table of "good" and "bad" solicitors. Transactions are far too complicated for that. But to give an agency genuine information from its own sales rather than relying entirely on memory and anecdote.
The legal work belongs with the conveyancers. The agent's job is to help clients make an informed choice, keep everyone connected once the sale is underway and know when something needs attention.