The average person only moves house once every seven years. 

A significant life milestone, either marriage, divorce, job (either relocation or retirement), is usually the catalyst in moving house. A wedding? A child? Perhaps an empty nest that leads to a downsize?

Whilst living in a property, most people will redecorate, or perhaps more substantial works have been done. 

Maybe a new kitchen, a new boiler or even an extension.

So when you come to move, it is likely that things in your life will look a lot different than when you moved in.

You have probably either forgotten or misplaced most of the paperwork and information you received when you bought the property.

But you will need it all again, and more, when you come to sell.

To help alleviate some of the stress when the solicitors start asking for plans and certificates, here are a few things that you should know before you go on the market that can help to speed things up when you accept an offer.

Your solicitor will have given you a copy of these when you first moved in.

The solicitor will be able to download them for you but, if you can find them, they confirm your boundary and can be helpful for the estate agents to have on file. 

Certificates.

Any work that you have had done will have a warranty and sign off certificate.

The solicitors will ask for these, and failure to produce them will mean that you may have to provide indemnity insurance policies, which will cost you money. Even if the warranty has expired, gather these together in advance.

Boiler and electric service records are going to be requested as a matter of course by the solicitors. It is not a legal requirement to provide these to your buyer. Still, it will show them that your property is safe and looked after and could sway them into offering more to secure your property over any others.

If your property has either of these within the boundary, it would be best to get the proof together so that your buyers can see without trying to figure things out with the solicitors. This could end up causing delays if something comes up that they were not aware of before making their offer.

You must provide ID to the agents when putting your property on the market and the solicitors when the offer is accepted. This is quite normal except, you will need to provide proof of address, and most people have all utility bills emailed to them, which is not accepted. If you don’t have any formal paperwork posted to your home address, you can ask your bank to send you a statement through the post. This can take up to 2 weeks to come through, and your solicitor will not start to work on your file unless they can confirm that you are who you say you are and have the authority to sell the property. You can often pay for an online ID check, but this is the last resort, and solicitors prefer to see a formal document in hard copy.

These points are mainly administrative, but when you have lived in your property for almost a decade, most paperwork is likely to be in the loft somewhere. 

Gathering everything together at the start of the process means that you are prepared and ready. Your buyer can see everything they need to at the outset, which can prevent a sale from falling through later on. It will also speed the sale process up by a few weeks because you are not scurrying around trying to find documents that have not seen the light of day for years!

Are you thinking about putting your home on the market?

Give us a call to book your valuation appointment.