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This post has been edited by wurst: Dec 11 2013, 11:23 AM

That's the problem, if your lawyers lazy and don't do their job fast, you'll end up having to pay interest, Donno if there could be conspiracy between your lawyer and vendor lawyer, purposely delay and split the profits.

Anyway recently someone complained in Malay Mail, he did his part promptly, but lawyer didn't do promptly and there was a RM400+ charge. After complain in papers the firm involved waived the charges.

That's why as brokers we have to review the service of the legal advisor and keep and recommend those that our provide our customer hassle free and speedy service. Of course, this is to our advantage.

My shit list :

1. Loh & Co - Based in Hartamas. Rude LA, and the boss dont seem to care. Maybe thats becoz Im a small fry......

law of suppiah, cant remember full but they are shit.

yalor...i oso wonder, if they pakat to do it slowly....like tat day my case...sending the documents from one another oso take so long...

I suppose we should come out with a list of lawyers to be avoided.

This post has been edited by wurst: Nov 24 2009, 09:39 PM

wah.. like that, i can list out many..

I have my fair share of encounters with lousy lawyers as well.

We should put together a list of good lawyers and give our business to them.

I just bought a house, I'm quite happy with my lawyer so far. We communicate with emails often and the response is fast. Actually she is the one that chasing me to sign the S&P. The discount they gave also the highest amount all I've checked

I signed my SPA on 10th Nov, and today i called my lawyer and am told im able to get my apartment in about 2weeks time. Now only waiting for my bank to pay money. Took my lawyer about a week ++ to prepare the SPA.

I think that was quite fast, having book the apartment (subsale) on 13th Oct, and expecting to get key sometime mid dec.

However, need to take account for these:
1. lawyer is a fren of mine
2. the apartment im buying is not owing bank money
3. the vendor and the bank agreed to use my SPA lawyer

I guess above item expedite the whole thing

after dealing for few houses, the only one lawyer kena my love letter was the citibank appointed lawyer for my BMC link house's loan agreement, office at MCA bulding one, delayed doc for few months and i got 4k+ interest charge by narajaya, called them, chase them, beg them also no action but one letter to BAR council then everything settle in two weeks.

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Added on November 24, 2009, 9:03 pmi demand them to pay for the late charge too, end up they paid 80% of the interest cause my loan interest is only 2% for first 3 years while narajaya charge us 10%..........fair .....
i think they are at loss doing my case but this is their fault

This post has been edited by APPA: Nov 24 2009, 09:03 PM

Lucky you, Chester!

A friend of mine has no choice but to pay for interest couple of months due to the lawyer delayed the handover of paperwork to the bank. I don't see the reason why it took him 4months for that purpose moreover the property is freehold while the previous owner had fully serviced the loan as well. Why us the buyer has to bare all these EXTRA expenses while it's the lawyer's work efficiency issue that caused the delay? Who should we refer to and where can we log a complaint agaisnt these matters?

but sometime not lawyer fault, can be legal assistant

got many law firm at MCA. which one?

I think it is not "sometimes"; it is "usually"....cos legal assistants handle these cases....especially if the value is not substantial

It's really disasterous to deal with irresponsible lawyers.

legal assistant = lawyers

It's a term used. I believe you would mean the clerks. Anyway, as part of the legal profession and since i handle some SPA matter as well, you have to note that its not all the case the same, where you can get it done in a month or so. It really depends on whether the property is encumbered, whether the property is charged/assigned (need to get redemption statement etc etc), whether the other side is responsive or not etc, how long it takes for adjudication and stamping etc. A lot of time, it is beyond anyone's control, like we cant rush the stamp office, land office etc. Hard to rush the bank as well. A good lawyer is one who can protect your interest with a well drafted SPA, on top of the following up work. Because with a well drafted agreement, it should be sufficient to cover any penalty etc, in the event of any unforeseen circumstances.

I seriously think people need to understand the whole procedure of an SPA transaction, before slating the lawyers. And please do not think the legal fees are expensive, because usually half of the legal fees are your stamp duties etc. With small firms giving ridiculous amount of discount illegally, the service are actually compromised, because instead of taking decent amount of work, they have to take ALOT of files to make up for the same amount, hence the quality drops, less time to focus and follow up etc.

You pay peanuts, you get peanuts i supposed.

1. A good lawfirm is the one that gets the job done within the agreed time frame. We paid lawfirms/lawyers to deal with the subject, so that we dont have to be the expert. Most of the lawfirms I know only good at promising good service, but deliver sub-par service, exceed datelines etc then gave 1000 excuses. Typical.....

2. Few thousand bucks aint peanuts mate. U took a fee for a specific job, then one should deliver. No excuses. If you cant do the job properly, thenu shouldnt take the case. Its simple.

Look, like i say, the usual timeframe for a transaction to be completed, i.e. from the date of signing the SPA to the date of getting the keys, would be 90 days. Its the standard timeframe, for bank loan etc etc. However, if there's any state consents required etc, it would be much longer, depending on how fast the land office can get things done. Therefore, to demand a transaction to be completed within 1 month, would be unreasonable. Yes, there are times where the transaction can be completed before 3 months period, but that is entirely dependant on a lot of factors as well. I am not saying the lawyers should give excuses etc, but you have to appreciate what we are doing as well. It's not as simple as 1,2, 3 and trust me, the few thousands you are paying is not as if, just for the few pages of agreement, because it encompasses a lot of other stuff.

Further, let me reiterate, there's a scale fee for a reason. And most of the time, 60% of what you paid are for disbursement which the chunk is for stamp duty. Like i say, lawyers are human too, we need to earn a living too. What i am trying to say is that, instead of originally a lawyer just need to take 10 files to earn 10 thousand for example, because of the clients kept demanding discount and other smaller firms giving insane discount, the lawyer will now need to take 20 files to earn 10 thousand now. And because of that, his time allocated for your file would be halved. I am just trying to say, there's two side of the coin. By pushing the price down, you are forcing him or her to take more files to earn his usual revenue, hence the lower quality work given. I do not advocate that, hence i do not usually give discount, because its against the rule, and we have a certain integrity to keep. Its not like we are charging way beyond what we are supposed to charge. I believe, by charging fairly and giving quality work, it will still get a good amount of clients, including repeat clients.

Talk about efficiency - the law firm can collect the documents on Wednesday, but they only send their office boy the document on the following Monday.....can tis be compromise?