Angela Ingall

By Angela Ingall Angela Ingall

— Angela Ingall is a Licensed Conveyancer in the residential property department at McKinnells Solicitors in Lincoln.

Despite the government’s recent reduction in the feed-in tariff, solar panels are still being installed on the roofs of private homes at an ever-increasing rate.

Most streets will now have a house with them on. While the move to green energy is to be encouraged, homeowners should make the decision to have these panels installed with eyes wide open and in full knowledge of the legal implications.

Before they are installed, it would be wise to check the house structure is up to the job. Once the panels are in place, will they cause problems with the roof support? If they do, the remedial cost is likely to fall on you.

Unless your house is in a conservation area or is listed, you won’t need planning permission. You will, though, need building regulation approval. If you have the panels fitted without it, you could face action from your local authority.

If you have a mortgage, you will need the prior consent of your mortgage lender. Without it, you will be in breach of your mortgage and the lender could pull the plug on the loan and require you to pay it back.

A common arrangement is that the homeowner grants a lease, typically for 25 years, to a company to install the panels on the roof. These leases do not have a break clause, that is, the homeowner has no power to end them earlier so the panels will be on the roof for the whole 25 years.

One effect is that if the homeowner wants to sell the house within the 25-year period, he or she can only sell to someone willing to buy the house with the panels in place. That may not be too much of a problem, though it does limit the potential market for the house.

But what about a few years down the line when solar panel technology has moved on, as it inevitably will? A comparison is with mobile phones. 25 years ago, they were the size of a house brick with limited range.

Imagine in a few years time having the solar panel equivalent of a 1980s mobile phone on your roof. It may well make selling your house very difficult, as well as tying you in to what by then is likely to be an inefficient system.

You should also consider who is responsible for the maintenance of the panels. If it is you as the homeowner there will be an as yet unknown cost, which is likely to increase over time.

If the company who supplied them, they are likely to want access rights 24/7. Are you willing and able to let them have this?

So, if you are thinking of going green, get some legal advice first, otherwise you could be left feeling blue and in the red instead.

Angela Ingall is a Licensed Conveyancer in the residential property department McKinnells Solicitors in Lincoln

By Angela Ingall Angela Ingall

— Angela Ingall is a Licensed Conveyancer in the residential property department at McKinnells Solicitors in Lincoln

Recently, I was asked to act for an RAF pilot on a house purchase. Before he asked me though, his opening line was that he had read a book on conveyancing and it seemed quite simple, so he asked me to give him a reason why he could not just do all the legal work himself?

I told him I had recently read a book by James May, one chapter of which was about how to fly a jumbo jet. That too seemed quite simple, so on that basis, could I please fly his jet fighter? He smiled and then asked me to deal with the house purchase. True story.

The law relating to property is far from simple, but it’s part of the lawyer’s job to explain complex legal principles and a sometimes hard to fathom process to the client in simple terms so the client feels comfortable with what is going on. Einstein said if an expert cannot explain a difficult concept in simple terms then the expert has not understood the concept.

With most things in life it is what we don’t that gets us into trouble. In recent years there has been a trend by some legal firms for property work to be done by staff with no qualifications and little or no experience. This means the work can be done at a superficially attractive price. If you think about it, though, a house sale or purchase is, for most people, the single most expensive transaction they deal with during their life.

Does a cheaper conveyancing cost come before peace of mind that you actually own the house, that ramblers don’t have a right to walk through your kitchen or that a new road is not going to be built across the front lawn, especially when the cost of using a quality assured lawyer is usually less than £100 more than using a trainee with no experience?

To help consumers be assured of a quality legal service when buying or selling property, the Law Society, which represents all solicitors in England and Wales, introduced a Conveyancing Quality Standard last year. To qualify, firms had to pass a rigorous audit with all staff having to meet high competency standards.

McKinnells was the first firm in Lincoln to achieve this quality mark. If when buying eggs, most people will look for the lion mark as a sign of quality. If you want a quality property service, look for the CQS mark.

Angela Ingall is a Licensed Conveyancer in the residential property department McKinnells Solicitors in Lincoln