How much does a lawyer cost when selling your apartment?
The standard fee when selling an apartment is around $1000 with no mortgage and can be $200-300 more if there is a mortgage involved. If you have a complicated situation or need a lawyer with specific needs it can cost you up to $2500 when selling your apartment.
SUMMARY:
The standard fee when selling an apartment is around $1000 with no mortgage and can be $200-300 more if there is a mortgage involved. This extra cost is due to having the mortgage discharged.
If you have a complicated situation or unique specifications it can cost you up to $2500 when selling your apartment. This is where we recommend you find a lawyer with expertise in property.
The apartment industry is a different to houses so finding someone who can help you in this area is worth paying the money. At Apartment Specialists we can help you source an appropriate person in this situation. An example of a more complicated sale may be if the property is Leasehold or there are tenant issues.
TRANSCRIPTION:
Good day, Andrew Murray here from the Apartment Specialists. How much does a lawyer charge you or cost you when you sell your apartment? Typically speaking, on average they'll charge between around about $800 and $1,000 for the transaction when you sell your apartment and if you're discharging the mortgage, ie, if you have a mortgage on your apartment, you'll probably-- allow another $200. On average, you're looking really probably around between $1,000 and $1,100 when you sell your apartment.
However, with a little asterisk, there are times where you need to spend more, and this is when you're dealing with properties that are, for example, leasehold or have issues, have renting problems, or just complicated in some way. That's where you really need to use the expertise of your lawyer. The reason for this is the lack of understanding with apartments.
So many lawyers around New Zealand just haven't dealt with them. They're so used to dealing with houses and understandably, because apartments when you think about it are relatively new. When you think back to 1991, there were only 564 apartments in the CBD and now there's 20,000 plus. In those cases, are looked for by particular lawyers that are recommended by vendors who specialise in leasehold or apartments with issues or special leases.
In those situations, those lawyers are worth their weight in gold cause they can be the difference between a mediocre offer going through and a sale happening and ending up falling over; and the reason for that is they actually end up educating the other lawyer. For example, I just leave after this one point.
The reason why I did this podcast this I'm coming across more and more situations where lawyers are going. Well, I don't and they're actually saying that "I don't have the expertise here. Can you recommend another lawyer?" Or in some cases, "I just don't understand it". That's good when I lawyer does that.
They're doing their job properly, but it's when the lawyers take on the work because it's work when they actually don't know what they're doing there the problem lies. You know, usually a house.
Andre Murray, Apartment Specialists. How much does a lawyer cost.
If you have any questions, flick me an email at [email protected] or call +6421 424 892 and I’ll be happy to answer your queries.
Cheers.