The Gazette 1964/67

The Council will be obliged for your comments." The Society also wrote to Deputy Mark Clinton on 5/11/65: — "Dear Deputy, In the Irish Times of November 3rd you were re ported as having stated during the debate on the Housing Bill that the legal expenses of a house costing £3,500 are £450, and the auctioneer's fees about £175 for the privilege of buying one's own house. If you are correctly reported you have been badly misinformed. Solicitors' costs for the purchase of a house costing £3,500 are £97-10-0 where the title has not been registered. If the title has been fully registered the costs are £53-15-0. The stamp duty charged by the State is £105-0-0 except in the case of a house bought with the assistance of a housing grant from the Depart ment of Local Government. In the latter case the stamp duty is £35-0-0. These are the purchaser's solicitors costs. The only other costs chargeable would be the mortgagee's costs if the property is bought with a Building Society Loan. The total amount could not remotely approach the figure quoted. In the common case of a new house where a lease is taken of an underdeveloped site the costs are usually lower than the figure which I have given for a sale for £3,500 or unregistered land. Auctioneers' fees are not in the control of the solicitors profession but if the property were sold by public auction the auctioneer's fees would be £175, payable by the purchaser. If the property is in Dublin and the sale is by private treaty the house agent's fees will be £87-10-0. Outside Dublin the house agents fees on a private sale would be £175-0-0. If you require any further information I shall be glad to supply it and I hope you will take the opportunity of correcting the wrong impression created by the report if you have the opportunity of doing so." In 22/11/65 the Society received the following letter from Deputy Clinton: — "Dear Sir, You wrote to me some time ago in relation to figures quoted by me in the Dail while discussing the Housing Bill. These figures were supplied to me by a firm of House Purchase Loan Specialists, and I naturally ac cepted them as correct. The document I received was headed "Charges on Purchase of House valued £3,500," and underneath the following figures were given: £ s. d. Stamp Duty ........................... 105 0 0 Purchaser's Solicitors Fees ............ 105 0 0 Purchaser's Solicitor's Fees dealing with Mortgage .................. 45 0 0 Mortgage Solicitor's Fee on Loan of £3,000 .............................. 45 0 0

to fees and I very much regret if these figures are not accurate, and, at the earliest opportunity, I will quote the figures given to me by you." On 8/12/65 the society received the following letter from the office of the Minister for Local Government:— "A Chara, I am directed by Mr. Neil T. Blaney, Minister for Local Government, to refer to your letter of 5th Nov ember, 1965, about a report in the Irish Times of 3rd November on the Housing Bill, 1965, in which references were made to the costs of house purchase. During the course of the debates in the Dail, Deputy Clinton stated that the cost of purchasing a £3,500 house was about £450. This caused a general dis cussion on the incidental costs of house purchase, par ticularly in the case of new houses with which the Housing Bill is primarily concerned. It was in this context that the Minister stated that he was not mak ing any apology for the stamp duty charged by the State. His remarks are reproduced in the Dail Debates for 2nd November, 1965, at column 946. The stamp duty on a new grant house bought by way of lease of the site, as is the common practice, would generally not exceed £3. If, as is the less usual case, stamp duty is charged on the purchase price after completion of the house, it would amount to £35. Stamp duty on old or non-grant houses or other property costing over £2,500 is, as you say, charged at the rate of 3 per cent. The same arguments for a concessionary rate of duty do not, however, apply here as in the case of new houses. The Minister is very conscious of the fact that legal fees on house purchase in England are considerably lower than here and that those in Scotland are lower still. The English Incorporated Law Society have car ried out an investigation directed at simplifying the whole business of house conveyancing with the possi bility of a further reduction in costs and fees. The Minister would be glad to know if your Society would be willing to institute a similar investigation here." On 20/12/65 the Society wrote the following letter to the office of the Minister for Local Government: — "Dear Sir, I acknowledge receipt of your letter of December 8th. Deputy Clinton has acknowledged that the figure of £450, with which he was supplied as the legal costs of the purchaser of property for £3,500 with a mortgage of £3,000, was incorrect. The Council fail to see why attention is always focussed on solicitors' charges in considering the overall cost of conveyancing and in vestigation of title. There are other far more important elements in the total, including auctioneer's fees and stamp duty. A solicitor acting for a vendor or pur chaser carries a very heavy responsibility for negligence and in effect guarantees the client against loss in con nection with the transaction. In the present case the impression created by the discussion in Dail Eireann was that stamp duty at 3 per cent is solicitor's remuneration and the costs of the vendor's and purchaser's solicitors and the stamp duty were added together and repre sented as the legal fees of the purchaser's solicitor. The Council are satisfied that short of the establish ment of a comprehensive system of registration of title proposed under the Registration of Title Act 1964 there is no method of simplifying the title investigation part 72

TOTAL: ............

300 105

0 0

0 0

Vendor's Solicitor's Fee

£405

0

0

I cannot understand why a firm of this kind would have any interest in exaggerating the position in relation