ValuQ Property Glossary
Conveyancing: the process
Conveyancing is the legal work that turns an agreed sale into a completed one, and it runs on terms nobody explains until you are mid-transaction. Here is the whole process, term by term.
54 terms · Last reviewed 24 July 2026.
Conveyancing
Conveyancing is the legal transfer of property ownership from seller to buyer, from accepted offer to registration of the new owner.
It covers the contract, searches, enquiries, mortgage legalities, exchange, completion and the money. Weeks of it happen in silence; silence is not the same as nothing happening.
Related: Exchange of contracts, Completion · What is conveyancing? →
Conveyancer vs solicitor
A solicitor is a qualified lawyer who may handle many areas of law, while a licensed conveyancer is a specialist qualified specifically in property transactions.
For a standard sale or purchase both are fully capable and regulated. Complexity elsewhere in your life, such as divorce or probate entangled with the sale, favours a solicitor's broader reach.
Related: Licensed conveyancer
Licensed conveyancer
A licensed conveyancer is a property-law specialist regulated by the Council for Licensed Conveyancers rather than the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
Same job on a standard transaction, sometimes keener pricing. Regulation and insurance protect you either way.
Related: Conveyancer vs solicitor
CQS and lender panels
Also known as: panel solicitor, Conveyancing Quality Scheme
CQS is the Law Society's quality accreditation for conveyancing firms, and a lender panel is the list of firms a mortgage lender allows to act on its loans.
A firm outside your buyer's lender's panel means a second firm gets added to represent the lender, adding cost and time. Worth one early question when instructing.
Client care letter
A client care letter is the document setting out what your conveyancer will do, what it costs, and how to complain, sent at the start of the work.
Signing and returning it quickly, with ID, is what actually starts the file. The quoted fee and the disbursements list live here.
Related: Terms of business, Disbursements
Terms of business
Terms of business are the contractual small print of your conveyancer's engagement: liability, payment, file storage and termination.
The abortive fee, what you owe if the sale collapses, is the clause worth reading twice.
Related: Abortive fee
Client account
A client account is the ring-fenced bank account where a law firm holds money belonging to clients, separate from its own funds.
Deposits, mortgage advances and sale proceeds all move through it under strict accounting rules. It is why property money routes through solicitors at all.
Related: Conveyancing payment fraud
ID and anti-money-laundering checks
Also known as: AML, KYC
Anti-money-laundering checks are the identity and funding verifications every conveyancer, agent and lender must run before acting for you.
Photo ID, address proof and questions about where money came from are legal requirements, not nosiness. Doing them promptly at the start saves a week you will want later.
Related: Source of funds
Source of funds
Source of funds is the evidence trail showing where the money for a purchase actually came from: savings history, sale proceeds, gifts or inheritance.
Statements showing the money accumulating are what satisfy it. Large unexplained arrivals in an account shortly before buying are what stall it.
Related: Source of wealth, Gifted deposit
Source of wealth
Source of wealth is the broader question behind source of funds: how the person came to have their money overall.
Asked where sums are large or circumstances unusual. Answered once, properly, with documents.
Related: Source of funds
TA6 Property Information Form
The TA6 is the standard form where the seller answers formal questions about the property: disputes, alterations, boundaries, flooding, knotweed and more.
Your answers carry legal weight, and wrong ones can be sued on as misrepresentation years later. Answer what you know, say not known where you genuinely do not, and never guess.
What to watch: The TA6 outlives completion. It is the document a buyer's claim quotes back at you, so treat every answer as if a judge will read it.
Related: Misrepresentation, TA10 Fittings and Contents Form · What sellers must disclose →
TA10 Fittings and Contents Form
The TA10 is the form recording exactly what stays and what goes: appliances, curtains, sheds, light fittings, plants.
Completion-day disputes are almost always TA10 disputes. Precision here is free; arguments later are not.
Related: Fixtures and fittings · What to leave when you sell →
TA7 Leasehold Information Form
The TA7 is the extra form leasehold sellers complete, covering the lease, ground rent, service charges and the managing agent.
It pairs with the management pack ordered from the freeholder or agent. Leasehold sales move at the speed this paperwork arrives.
Related: LPE1 management pack, Leasehold
TA13 Completion Information
The TA13 is the form finalising completion practicalities: where keys will be, the exact money required, and the seller's solicitor's undertakings.
Late-stage machinery. Its arrival means completion is genuinely close.
Related: Completion, Undertaking
Contract (sale contract)
The contract is the legal agreement recording the parties, price, property and terms on which it will change hands.
Two identical copies are signed, one by each side, and swapped at exchange. Until that moment it binds nobody.
Related: Exchange of contracts, Special conditions
Standard conditions of sale
The standard conditions of sale are the industry-standard terms incorporated into most residential contracts, governing deposits, timings and remedies.
They are why most contracts look alike: the 10% deposit, the completion mechanics and the notice to complete regime all live here.
Related: Special conditions, Notice to complete
Special conditions
Special conditions are the bespoke clauses added to a particular contract, overriding the standard ones where they conflict.
Reduced deposits, occupation before completion, and included chattels all arrive as special conditions. They are the part of the contract actually negotiated.
Related: Standard conditions of sale
Contract pack
Also known as: draft contract
The contract pack is the bundle the seller's solicitor issues to start the legal work: draft contract, title documents and the completed property forms.
How fast it goes out is the first measurable sign of how your sale will run. Sellers who return their forms in days move their whole sale up a gear.
Related: TA6 Property Information Form, Official copies
Engrossment
Engrossment is the final, clean version of a document prepared for signature once its terms are agreed.
When your solicitor sends the engrossed contract, the drafting is over and the signing begins.
Related: Contract (sale contract)
Searches
Searches are formal enquiries of official bodies about a property: the council, the water company, the environment databases and more.
The buyer's solicitor orders them; the buyer pays. They protect the buyer and the lender from what the seller might not even know.
Related: Local authority search, Environmental search · Buyer hasn't ordered searches? →
Drainage and water search
Also known as: CON29DW
The drainage and water search confirms whether a property connects to mains water and sewerage, and where the pipes run.
A public sewer under the garden constrains extensions; no mains drainage changes the ownership conversation entirely.
Related: Septic tanks and private drainage
Environmental search
The environmental search screens a property's land for contamination history, flood risk, ground stability and similar hazards from databases.
A desktop screen, not a site visit. A flagged result usually means a further report rather than a dead sale.
Related: Flood risk
Chancel repair liability
Chancel repair liability is an ancient obligation on some land to contribute to repairs of the local parish church.
Rare in practice and cheaply insured against, which is exactly what most solicitors do rather than research medieval records.
Related: Indemnity insurance
Coal mining search
A coal mining search checks whether past or planned mining could affect a property's ground stability, standard in coalfield areas.
Equivalent searches exist for tin, brine and other extraction in their own regions. The search is routine where it is needed and skipped where it is not.
Planning search
A planning search reveals planning applications and decisions near a property, showing what could be built around it.
The local authority search covers the property itself; the planning search covers the neighbourhood. Buyers order it when the field behind the house looks suspiciously developable.
Related: Planning permission
Highways search (adopted roads)
Also known as: adopted vs unadopted road
A highways search confirms whether the roads serving a property are adopted, meaning maintained at public expense, or private.
An unadopted road means residents share its upkeep. On new estates, a Section 38 agreement with a bond is what guarantees the developer's roads eventually get adopted.
Related: Estate charges on freehold estates
Regulated (personal) vs official search
An official search comes from the council itself, while a regulated or personal search is compiled from council records by a search company.
Both are insurance-backed and widely accepted, and personal searches are often faster. Some lenders specify which they will take.
Related: Local authority search
Search indemnity insurance
Search indemnity insurance covers a buyer against loss from issues a skipped search would have found, used when time is too short to order the real thing.
Common on remortgages and auction deadlines. It pays money if things go wrong; it never tells you what the search would have told you.
Related: Indemnity insurance
Pre-contract enquiries
Pre-contract enquiries are the buyer's solicitor's questions to the seller's solicitor about the property, raised on the contract pack.
Standard sets plus anything the title or forms provoke. Slow, vague answers here are the single most common cause of conveyancing delay.
Related: Additional enquiries, Replies to enquiries · Endless enquiries: is something wrong? →
Additional enquiries
Additional enquiries are follow-up questions raised after the first answers, searches or survey produce something new.
A second round is normal; a fourth usually signals either a genuine problem or an over-cautious lawyer. Your own solicitor can push back on fishing expeditions.
Related: Pre-contract enquiries
Replies to enquiries
Replies to enquiries are the seller's formal answers, given through their solicitor, which the buyer relies on legally.
Like the TA6, replies can found a misrepresentation claim if wrong. The safe pattern is precise answers, documents attached, and honesty about what is not known.
Requisitions on title
Requisitions on title are the buyer's solicitor's final pre-completion questions, confirming the mechanics of completing: undertakings, redemption and keys.
Largely standardised. Their arrival is a milestone: it means exchange has happened or is imminent.
Related: TA13 Completion Information, Completion
Exchange of contracts
Exchange of contracts is the moment a sale becomes legally binding, when the two signed contracts are formally swapped and the deposit is paid.
Done by telephone between solicitors under Law Society formulas. Before it, anyone can walk away; after it, walking away has a price. Completion is fixed at exchange.
Related: Completion, Exchange deposit · Exchange vs completion →
Exchange deposit
Also known as: the 10%
The exchange deposit is the sum, traditionally 10% of the price, paid by the buyer at exchange as security for completing.
If the buyer fails to complete, the seller can keep it. Reduced deposits of 5% are commonly negotiated, though the contract usually preserves liability for the full 10%.
Related: Exchange deposit vs mortgage deposit, Notice to complete
Deposit held as stakeholder vs agent
A deposit held as stakeholder stays untouched with the seller's solicitor until completion, while one held as agent can be released to the seller immediately.
Stakeholder is the standard and safer basis. Agent-held deposits fund a seller's own onward deposit, at the buyer's risk if things collapse.
Related: Exchange deposit
Insurance from exchange
Insurance from exchange is the standard rule that the buyer bears the risk of damage to the property from the moment contracts exchange, and should insure it that day.
Counterintuitive but standard: the house can burn down between exchange and completion and the buyer must still complete. Buildings cover starting at exchange is the answer.
Related: Exchange of contracts
Completion
Completion is the day the purchase money moves, ownership transfers, and the keys are released.
Money flows up the chain bank by bank, which is why keys often release at lunchtime rather than breakfast. Once the seller's solicitor confirms receipt, the house is the buyer's.
Related: Completion date, CHAPS payment · What happens on completion day →
Completion date
The completion date is the contractual day the sale must complete, fixed at exchange and binding on both sides.
Commonly a week or two after exchange, occasionally the same day. Removals, schools and mortgage deadlines all negotiate around this one date.
Related: Simultaneous exchange and completion
Simultaneous exchange and completion
Simultaneous exchange and completion is exchanging contracts and completing on the same day, with no binding gap in between.
It removes the gazumping window and compresses the risk into one morning: nobody is committed until everyone moves at once. Common on chain-free and auction-adjacent deals.
Related: Exchange of contracts, Completion
Notice to complete
A notice to complete is the formal demand served when one side misses the completion date, giving ten working days to complete before contracts can be terminated.
It starts the clock on real consequences: interest accrues daily, and at the end the innocent party can rescind and keep or reclaim the deposit.
Related: Rescission, Breach of contract
Rescission
Rescission is the formal cancellation of the contract after a serious default, unwinding the deal.
For a seller facing a defaulting buyer it means keeping the deposit and remarketing. The nuclear option the notice to complete points at.
Related: Notice to complete
Breach of contract
Breach of contract is failing to perform what the exchanged contract requires, most seriously failing to complete on the day.
Only possible after exchange, which is precisely why exchange matters. Damages can exceed the deposit where losses run higher.
Related: Notice to complete, Exchange of contracts
Licence to occupy
A licence to occupy is a formal permission for a buyer to move in before completion, on terms, without becoming the owner.
Solicitors resist it for good reason: an occupant with furniture in place has little incentive to hurry completion. Used sparingly, papered carefully.
Related: Completion · Buyer wants to move in early? →
Completion statement
A completion statement is the solicitor's final account of the money: price, deposit, fees, redemption, apportionments, and the net sum due to or from you.
Read it before completion day, not after. Querying a line item is normal; discovering one in hindsight is expensive.
Related: Apportionments, Redemption figure
Completion retention
A completion retention is part of the price held back by agreement at completion until the seller resolves something specific, such as final bills or agreed works.
A practical tool on leasehold sales awaiting final service charge accounts. The retention terms, amount and release trigger are written into the contract.
Related: Service charge
Apportionments
Apportionments are the completion-day adjustments splitting ongoing costs fairly between seller and buyer, such as ground rent or service charges paid in advance.
Calculated to the day on the completion statement. Small numbers, frequently queried, easily checked.
Related: Completion statement
Fixtures and fittings
Fixtures are items attached to the property that sell with it by default, while fittings are freestanding items the seller may take.
A fitted kitchen is a fixture; the fridge standing in it is a fitting. The TA10 form exists because the default rules argue badly with human assumptions.
Related: TA10 Fittings and Contents Form, Chattels · What to leave when you sell →
Chattels
Chattels are the movable items in a property, from furniture to appliances, which are not part of the land being sold.
Chattels bought from the seller can be priced separately in the contract, and that apportionment reduces the stamp duty base if it is honest. Inflating it to dodge tax is evasion, and HMRC has seen every version of it.
Occupier consent form
Also known as: occupier's waiver
An occupier consent form is signed by any adult living in the property who is not an owner, agreeing to leave on completion and waiving occupation rights against the buyer and lender.
Standard where a partner, adult child or relative lives in. It protects the buyer and lender from discovering a resident with rights after paying.
Related: Home rights notice
Conveyancing payment fraud
Also known as: Friday afternoon fraud, bank detail fraud
Conveyancing payment fraud is criminals impersonating a solicitor by email to redirect completion money to their own account.
The defence is procedural: verify bank details by phone on a number you already hold, treat any emailed change of account as fraud until proven otherwise, and send a test payment first.
What to watch: House money stolen this way is rarely recovered. No legitimate law firm changes its bank details by email mid-transaction.
Related: Client account · Property scams to watch →
Undertaking
An undertaking is a solicitor's binding professional promise, such as to redeem the mortgage from sale proceeds, enforceable by their regulator.
Undertakings are what let completion work on trust between strangers: the system runs on promises that carry professional consequences.
Related: Redemption figure
CHAPS payment
Also known as: telegraphic transfer, TT, same-day transfer
A CHAPS payment is the same-day guaranteed bank transfer used to move completion money, for a fee of a few tens of pounds.
Ordinary transfers have limits and delays that house-sized sums cannot risk. The fee appears on your completion statement as a TT or bank transfer charge.
Related: Completion funds, Telegraphic transfer fee
Keys release
Keys release is the seller authorising the agent to hand over keys once their solicitor confirms the completion money has arrived.
The agent will not release early without instruction, however long the buyer's van has been waiting. Money first, keys second is the whole system.
Related: Completion
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