When the mortgage starts
On the day of completion, your conveyancer will pay the seller's conveyancer the balance of the purchase price. Ownership of the property is transferred to you and you become entitled to have the keys and move in.
The seller’s conveyancer will pay off the seller’s mortgage and send your conveyancer the transfer document and any other relevant documents, for example property guarantees. Your conveyancer will then register your ownership and the mortgage at the Land Registry/Registers of Scotland and pay any Government Land Tax owing.
If you've an existing loan that must be repaid, your conveyancer will send the money to your current lender and that loan will end.
Ownership of the property
When two people buy a property together they're normally registered at the Land Registry as co- owners. There are two main ways of co-owning property, and the legal terms for these are ‘joint tenants’ and ‘tenants in common’. With joint tenants, the law regards the co-owners as owning the whole of the property between them. When one of them dies, the whole of the property passes to the other. Usually, the survivor only needs to provide a death certificate to prove their entitlement to full ownership. Joint tenancy is a much used form of ownership between married and civil partners.
However, family matters can be complex and you may not want complete ownership of the property to automatically pass to the other co-owner. If so, you may want to consider asking your conveyancer to register you as tenants in common.
If you own your property as tenants in common, each of you owns only a share in the home. This could be 50/50, but if one of you puts down a bigger proportion of the deposit, you may want to take unequal shares, for example 60/40. If you die, your share will pass into your estate and be dealt with in line with the terms of your will (or the rules of intestacy, if you don’t leave a will).
This way of holding the property may be useful if you're unmarried or have children from a previous relationship. It can also be used as part of estate planning (to try to pay less inheritance tax). You should ask your conveyancer to explain more about the ways two or more people can own a property.
Occupation of the property
Except in Scotland, anyone over 17 years old who is not your son or daughter but who will be living at the property to be mortgaged will have to sign a consent to the mortgage form. By signing this they agree not to claim tenancy rights if we take possession of your property because you do not keep up your monthly payments.