What is legal indemnity insurance?
For some years now legal indemnity insurance has been widely used in the conveyancing market. Figures show that about one in five residential property transactions result in its use and in commercial property transactions legal indemnity insurance is often vital to assist the developer in allowing them to obtain funding in order to proceed with the project.
Indemnity insurance offers an efficient and in most cases a relatively straightforward and cost effective solution.
What can be covered?
Indemnity insurance can cover a wide range of issues and is a simple and efficient solution to a variety of title defects, providing cover to the value of property investment. It is important to remember that a claim made against a legal indemnity policy may not result in the insured defect being rectified but rather it may result in a payment of money to a property owner to compensate them for losses sustained as a result of the defect.
What policies are available?
There are many types of risk that can be covered and almost all legal defects can be insured against depending on the circumstances. Some common examples of policies are restrictive covenants, mines and minerals, lack of planning permission or building regulations approval, missing easements, good leasehold title, absent/insolvent landlord and search indemnity to name but a few.
For some examples of risk solutions we have provided click here.
When might changes to the policy be needed?
Most legal indemnity policies last indefinitely until the risk they cover has been discharged so it is important to ensure that the cover remains appropriate. The cover is a defined limit of indemnity which will normally represent the current market value of a house or the gross development value of a development site so should an increased limit be required the policy will need to be changed to reflect this. Also an important consideration is the definition of Insured Use in the policy. For example post-planning cover for a development is often tied to a specific planning consent so if planning consent is revised or varied compared to the original planning consent you will need to get the policy amended.
The future
There is no doubt Legal indemnity insurance has made the conveyancing process faster and more efficient and has also taken some of the exposure away from property lawyers. It is likely that this trend will continue and that indemnity insurance will still be seen as the ideal solution in many cases.
What we do
At Arlington our team is made up of highly experienced professionals and a reputation that is built on delivering a first-class service and specialist expertise. We offer a fully independent broking service and can quickly arrange quotes on your behalf from a number of different markets which will save you time and cost.
Need a quote?
If you are a solicitor or conveyancer we would be delighted to hear from you and our principle points of contact for Legal Indemnities are:
Tony Housden on 020 7292 6018 or [email protected]
Paul Stoner on 020 7292 6012or [email protected]
