Skip to content

Click here to read our Christmas update

National Association of Women's Clubs logo
  • Home
  • About
    • What We Do
    • History
    • Meet The Team
  • Campaigns
  • Clubs
  • Join Us
  • Shop
  • Events
  • News
  • Contact
National Association of Women's Clubs logo
  • Home
  • About
    • What We Do
    • History
    • Meet The Team
  • Campaigns
  • Clubs
  • Join Us
  • Shop
  • Events
  • News
  • Contact
  • Back to Campaigns

Review the law regarding house purchase and bring it in line with Scottish law

“This Association in Conference assembled urges Her Majesty’s Government to review the law regarding house purchase and bring it in line with Scottish law.”

North Warwickshire Association,

2015

Buying and selling a house is one of the most stressful things anyone can do which is made more stressful by the current legislation in England. At present both seller and buyer have no rights until the contract is exchanged. A seller can at the 11th hour be told that the buyer cannot pay the agreed sum and be asked to reduce the cost, in some cases significantly. A purchaser can have their offer accepted, go to the expense of arranging a mortgage, instructing solicitors and undertaking searches for the seller to subsequently accept a higher offer. The buyer up to the moment of contracts are exchanged could reduce their offer or pull out completely at the present time in England, this would not happen in Scotland under Scottish law. Several of our members including myself have experienced such issues and lost thousands of pounds in the process.

In Scotland neither of these things can happen, once a price has been agreed a contract is drawn up and it is legally binding. In some cases the moving date can be several months away, particularly if it is a new build, but the sale will still go through. For the majority of people buying a house is the most expensive thing they will ever buy. It is stressful enough searching for the ideal home within your price range, without the added stress of knowing that nothing is certain until the day contracts are exchanged.

Reply from:- Lord Faulks QC, Minister of State for Justice
I am responding as the Minister responsible for civil law in England and Wales. The Government has no plans to review the law in the way you suggest at present. It is however aware of the problems of the current system and keen to find innovations on how to improve the experience of buying and selling a house, how this can be improved. The government therefore wants to consider and address the way the real estate and conveyancing markets have developed around the existing regulatory frameworks, to encourage greater innovation in the conveyancing sector and make the legal process more transparent and efficient.  To take this work forward the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is to publish a call for evidence later this year on home buying, exploring options to deliver better value and the experience of buying a home.  This was announced in A better deal: boosting competition to bring down bills for families and forms published by HM Treasury last November. Taking the law as it is at present, I agree that an offer to buy a house in England Wales is generally made and accepted ‘subject to contract’ and does not legally bind either party to the transaction. A legally binding contract is only created at a later stage when formal written contracts are exchanged. This is an important safeguard in the system for what will be the most expensive purchase a person may make. One consequence is, however, that during the ‘subject to contract’ period, either party may withdraw. In some cases, there may be legitimate reasons for breaking off a potential transaction, such as unemployment, illness or death in the family.  Changes of financial circumstances in the course of a transaction may also affect a party’s ability to proceed. In others, sellers such as trustees and executors are under a legal obligation to obtain the best price they can for a property. In these cases it would seem unfair to restrict or penalise the withdrawal from an agreement. I accept, however, that in a few cases, sellers and buyers may unfairly exploit their freedom from contractual obligations in the way you describe.

Buyers or sellers can try to protect themselves against the failure of a transaction by entering a ‘cost guarantee agreement’ so that the party who causes the transaction to fail will pay the whole or part of the other party’s costs and expenses.  The difficulty in practice is that few people are prepared to commit themselves in this way and compelling them to do so could well make the process more difficult. Compelling people to enter into cost guarantee agreements could well make the process of buying and selling even more fraught than present. An alternative means of protection is to enter into a conditional contract early in the transaction so that the grounds on which a person can withdraw are limited to those specified in the contract (it is a matter for negotiation between the parties to agree to appropriate conditions).This is similar to the traditional Scottish system, which is based on the conditional contracts with a lengthy period between exchange and completion following an initial invitation to tender. Upon acceptance of an offer there is an exchange of missive between buyer and seller. Missives are effectively a conditional contract between the two parties and only upon the completion of the conditions within the missives does the contract become unconditional. Until this final stage both the buyer and the seller are free to withdraw from the transaction if the conditions of the missives are not met to their satisfaction. Both systems are largely based on custom and practice. People who wish to use the ‘Scottish system’ in England and Wales are free to do so. Compelling them to do so may solve some problems but create others. People might, for example, have to be more willing than appears to be the case at present to move into temporary accommodation, which may be expensive and inconvenient, or take out bridging loans, which in addition to being costly, carry a significant financial risk because chains of transactions are difficult to operate in the context of conditional contracts. Additionally, where all the potential buyers make an offer at the same time, they may all have to spend money on legal work, valuation and survey fees before making the offer.  If there are a number of prospective buyers then all but one of them will have wasted their money.  We have, therefore, no plans to require the use of the ‘Scottish’ system at present.

National Association of Women's Clubs logo white

Quick Links

  • Home
  • History
  • Shop
  • Join Us
  • News

INFORMATION

  • What We Do
  • Clubs
  • Events
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy

get In Touch

  • The Army Reserve Centre, 312 London Road, Romford, Essex RM7 9NH
  • 01708 730805
  • nawc@btconnect.com
  • Follow Us

© 2020 NAWC. All Rights Reserved | Charity No. 273397 | Website by Space Five

This website uses cookies to improve your experience and provide statistics on site use. Find out moreACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview


This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled

Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.

Non-necessary

Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.

December Update

2020 is a year none of us will forget in a hurry but as it draws to a close we would like to update you with the current situation as far as Head Office is concerned. The office is now closed until after Christmas but Claire, our secretary, is working from home.

It has been a very strange year with no events, no clubs, no getting together. All our events had to be cancelled, and though we are no different to any other organisation it has been such a pity because this is what we are about friendship, education and fun. On the positive side we have worked hard getting out letters to as many members as we could with the help of club officials. They have been brilliant keeping in touch with their members through emails, ‘WhatsApp’ and phone calls they all deserve a star!

With the moving into different tiers it sometimes gets very confusing and loneliness has been talked about a lot on the television and the media but we hope through the clubs this has not affected our members too much. With the hope of a vaccine it might not be too long before we are back and enjoying our club life again and remember after December 21st the days start to get longer and Spring will be around the corner.

Here at Head Office Eleanor retired at the end of September, Eleanor had told us of her plans at the beginning of the year so we had plenty of notice but of course we could not have the retirement party she was entitled to. However, we are hoping she will come to conference next year and we can say farewell properly. We did send flowers on the day and Mary, our treasurer made her a collage of all our good wishes, and it was beautiful.

If you are looking at our website for the first time look at the list of clubs and see if we have one near you, they are friendly places to go to. Most meet once a week with speakers, demonstrations and outings. Each club is different and if there isn’t one in your area, why don’t you start one!  We honestly think our sort of club is just what the women of our country needs right now.  We are a non-political, non-religious and non- sectarian group that offers friendship and interest. Take a look at this website and see what we have to offer.

So Christmas is coming and what a difference to the one we probably envisaged, but remember ladies we might not be able to party as we have in the past but if we keep safe we can celebrate next year with family and friends. 

So on behalf of The Committee to all our members and whoever is looking at this website, we wish you all a Merry Christmas, keep well and let’s look forward to a better New Year.