Conveyancers and Estate Agents, overcoming risk of closure in 2023

We all know conveyancers work really hard in this conveyancing; it’s a credit to all conveyancers who are still in business. Not everyone has survived

Last year thousands of conveyancers and conveyancing solicitors just left the conveyancing profession due to burnout, overstress, and too much work. With so much more time involved in the role and with so less recourses, many more conveyancers are predicted to leave and more conveyancing firms to close.

Where does that leave conveyancers and their clients?

Also read: Make Conveyancing Faster – 5 Tips 

After 33 years as a solicitor, I still love this industry and those in it. There is still too much fighting between conveyancers.

Striving to work together to achieve the client’s outcome to move has to be the answer. It will reduce delays too. It’s a fact that the longer a case goes on, the more chance of it. The more proactive conveyancers become, the more conveyancers will achieve what everyone wants; to move the client before their sale or purchase falls through. That means faster transactions. Why shouldn’t the client move faster? Why wait five months (almost half s year!)?

All conveyancers know that the majority of delays can be pushed if all conveyancers put their minds to it. Conveyancers successfully managed to faster happen during the stamp duty deadline frenzy. It doesn’t have to be left to deadlines to try and all get on.

Also read: How a Conveyancer Helps You Stay in the Loop To Avoid Conveyancing Delays 

All conveyancers know there are things they could do differently. For starters to challenge the following:

Why let additional enquires drag on for weeks, sometimes months? Why don’t more conveyancers pick up the phone to sort out issues in minutes when emails can take weeks? Why not collaborate more with the other conveyancers and, yes, the estate agent too? Why not issue the contract pack on day one, not week two? Why not sort out AML early on, not before the exchange? Why not allow clients to use virtual signatures to speed things up? Why not report instantly on an online portal, not old fashioned post? Why not order office copies on a purchase?

It pennies against the weeks of delay lost in waiting for office copies to arrive from the seller’s lawyers. Will the buyer client really thank their lawyer when they have hundreds of thousands riding on their deal or losing their ideal move? Why not take payment for searches on day one and order on the same day rather than waiting days or weeks? Why argue over additional enquiries for weeks, sometimes months, knowing often it comes down to sorting it out legally or with indemnity? Why wait weeks to order the management pack? Why not chase them? I’m sure all conveyancers can add a lot more why’s.  If each lawyer changed one why the deal would go faster?

And one more crucial change. Conveyancers will help their clients and themselves by spending a big part of their budget on embracing innovation and keeping their team engaged, supported and with lower file numbers to give them the time to get involved more, pushing more.

Also read: How to find the best conveyancer