Who Pays for Searches
When Selling a House?

Selling a home is an expensive business, so it’s essential to understand who pays for what during the process.

As the ones who will ultimately benefit from finding out the results, home buyers are typically responsible for paying for conveyancing searches.

As the new owner of the house, they will have to deal with any past or future issues uncovered during the search if they want to go ahead with the property transaction.

Can Sellers Pay for House Searches?

There’s no hard rule that the buyer has to pay for house searches, even though it’s the norm.

Sometimes, if a property owner wants to speed up the house selling process, they can offer to pay for the property searches themselves as an extra incentive to buyers.

This may be an option if you’re looking to stand out on the property market and speed up the selling process for buyers. It can also be a smart idea if there’s currently a seller’s market (meaning there are more sellers than buyers) and competition is high.

When negotiating payment responsibilities, understanding the local market is crucial. It’s best for a legal professional to review the contract to ensure it complies with UK property laws.

What are Searches?

Searches (also known as conveyancing searches or property searches) involve verifying crucial details about a property before completing the sale.

Typicially, the buyer’s solicitor or conveyance will order the following:

• Title register and plan search – to check ownership and boundaries
• Local authority searches – include planning permission, building control, future developments like rail or highways, and listing status
• Environmental searches – include contaminated land, flooding, gas hazards, landfill, and landslide risks
• Water and drainage searches – for public water and drainage supplies, responsible water companies, and drainage systems
• Canal, river and mining searches – to check for any relevant risks
• Bankruptcy search – although this isn’t typically part of the core search package

What’s the Purpose of Searches?

Searches reassure the buyer that they know exactly what they’re buying and won’t run into any nasty surprises later.

If the buyer plans to borrow funds to buy a house, mortgage lenders may require searches.

How Much are Search Costs?

Before you decide whether to pay for a property search, you should know what you’re signing up for.

The exact cost can vary depending on the specific searches.

Paying for a basic search deposit monies will typically cost £200-350 for a residential purchase.

However, complete searches might cost more than this in more expensive parts of the UK, and complex properties may cost even more. This includes administrative and geographical considerations or anything else that is unique to the house (such as it being a listed property).

Often, a solicitor will include the cost of property searches with their conveyancing fees (often paid as an upfront fee).

However, there are other legal fees that aren’t included in this total when selling a house, such as land registry fees, CHAPS payment fees, and documentation.

Other Information Required to Sell Houses

The purpose of property searches is to provide the seller with extra information about the property.

However, not every relevant detail about a property is included in an environmental search, local authority search, and water and drainage search.

There are other factors too. Many of these are contained in a seller’s pack: a bundle of documents containing other crucial information about a property.

A peller’s pack includes:

• Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) – outlines how energy efficient a property is
• Property boundaries (including rights of way or easements)
• Past or present disputes with neighbours (e.g., your complaints about a noisy neighbour)

Sellers are typically responsible for these costs.

What to Do After a Search

In an ideal world, a search won’t uncover anything concerning about the property, so buyers and sellers will be free to move on with the sale.

Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case. If the conveyancing searches yield something, the buyer may need to take action about how to approach these potential risks.

Generally, when there are results, it’s a minor issue rather than something groundbreaking. The buyer may decide to take out indemnity insurance to cover themselves in case of any future issues with legal aspects, or a price negotiation process between buyer and seller.

Another option is to negotiate cost sharing arrangements, meaning both buyers and sellers pay a chunk of the costs.

It may be necessary to seek legal advice in some cases to help them decide what action to take.

Occassionally, there may be something the seller can do to take action to mitigate the effects of the searches. For instance, if there is Japanese knotweed, the seller may be able to pay for removing it.

Other Advice for Property Searches

In some areas, local authority searches can be a lengthy process, and they often take longer than drainage and water or environmental searches. It can take months (although if you’re more fortunate the search could be done in a week or two).

It’s a good idea to ask your local estate agents ahead of time what kind of waiting time you can expect.

This should go without saying, but if you’re a seller, you should aim to provide the most accurate information possible about the property.

Also, prepare for the worst and decide ahead of time what you’ll do if the search results aren’t what you expected.

Prepare For Your Sale

When selling a house in the UK, it’s generally the buyer who pays for searches since the results provide valuable insights about the property they’re about to buy.

However, in some cases, a seller might cover the costs to encourage a quick sale and that they’re willing to provide the necessary search reports. If you’re in any doubts about how to proceed, it’s always a good idea to seek professional advice abut how to proceed.

Is selling your house fast a priority for you? An alternative to paying for searches is to work with a quick sale company like Property Solvers. We can give you a cash offer and handle the rest of the process so you can sell your house in less than two weeks – to find out more, contact us today.