Can you do your own conveyancing?

Yes, you can legally do your own conveyancing in England and Wales. In practice, though, it's only an option if you're buying without a mortgage. Lenders need a solicitor or licensed conveyancer to check the title and register their charge over the property, and the UK Finance Mortgage Lenders' Handbook makes clear that many will only instruct firms on their own panel.

This is general information rather than legal advice, and the figures below will vary with your circumstances.

Who can realistically do their own conveyancing

The realistic candidate is a cash buyer purchasing a straightforward freehold house with a registered title. Add a mortgage, a leasehold flat, unregistered land or a long chain, and each one brings extra steps a first-timer is likely to miss. In any of those cases, we wouldn't recommend going it alone.

What the work involves

It's a lot more than filling in forms. You'd review the contract and the seller's property information form (the TA6), order searches, raise written enquiries with the seller's conveyancer, agree a completion date, exchange contracts and move the money.

Searches are the part most DIY buyers underestimate. A local authority search shows planning history, road adoption and any notices affecting the property. A drainage and water search shows whether the home is connected to the public sewer, and an environmental search covers flood and contamination risk.

Before completion, you'd apply to HM Land Registry for an official search with priority. That protects your purchase for 30 working days, giving your application priority over any others lodged after the search was made. Land Registry's practice guide 12 explains how it works.

After completion, you have 14 days to file a Stamp Duty Land Tax return and pay any tax due. Miss the deadline and there's a £100 penalty if you're up to three months late, rising to £200 after that, plus interest, according to HMRC's guidance on late returns.

Where DIY purchases go wrong

Most problems come from what the paperwork says, not how it's filled in. The title register might carry restrictive covenants that stop you running a business from home or building an extension. The road outside might not be adopted by the council, which can leave you sharing the cost of repairs with your neighbours. An extension might have gone up without planning permission or building regulations sign-off, and that becomes your problem when you come to sell.

A conveyancer checks for all of this as a matter of routine and raises it with the seller's side before exchange. Once you exchange contracts, you're legally committed to buy. Any question you haven't asked by then is one you've effectively accepted the answer to.

You also send the purchase money yourself. Always confirm the seller's bank details by phone with their conveyancer, using a number you've found independently. Emails announcing a "change of bank details" are a well-known property fraud.

A worked example on a £300,000 freehold in England

Say you're buying a £300,000 freehold house in England with cash. You're not a first-time buyer and you don't own any other property.

Stamp Duty is £5,000 whichever way you buy: nothing on the first £125,000, 2% on the next £125,000 (£2,500) and 5% on the last £50,000 (£2,500).

The costs you'd pay yourself on top of that:

Searches. A local authority search alone typically costs £250 to £300, according to MoneyHelper. Drainage and environmental searches add to that.

Land Registry fee. £330 to register a £200,001 to £500,000 purchase by post. Conveyancers pay £150 because they apply through the Land Registry portal, which isn't open to members of the public.

Official search with priority. A few pounds for a postal application.

The important thing to notice is that you'd pay the searches, Land Registry fee and Stamp Duty whether you used a conveyancer or not. The only real saving is the legal fee itself. MoneyHelper puts typical legal fees at about £2,000 including VAT, though fixed-fee quotes for a simple cash purchase can come in lower.

So on this purchase, doing it yourself saves you roughly whatever a conveyancer would have charged in legal fees, less the extra £180 you'd pay on the Land Registry fee by applying on paper.

Against that, every mistake is yours. If you miss a restriction on the title or a boundary problem, there's no professional indemnity insurance to claim on, because there's no professional involved.

Get a fixed-fee quote before you decide

For most cash buyers, the saving is smaller than it first looks, and the risk is all on you. Before choosing, read our list of questions to ask a conveyancing solicitor, then compare conveyancing quotes on Moving Compared to see what a regulated conveyancer would actually charge for your purchase.