Our Services

Possession Proceedings in England and Wales

Our expert team at David W Harris & Co Solicitors work closely with private landlords and agents to advise and assist with obtaining vacant possession of property.

If you seek assistance with regaining possession of your residential property, we are able to offer a fixed fee service. For the sake of transparency, we have listed our fixed fees below and have outlined the possession process in stages, each stage is dependent on your tenant or contract holder not vacating at an earlier stage. We can assist with the entire process or guide you through one particular stage. Our fee structure also allows our clients to split the cost of the possession process.

Stage 1: The first stage in regaining possession of a property is to serve notice on the tenant(s) or contract holder(s). There are a number of ‘prescribed requirements’ which must be complied with in order for the notice to be valid and enforceable; our expert team will be able to assess your tenancy documentation and advise on your current position. If any risks are foreseen, our team will be able to advise you on the best way to mitigate those risks.

Stage 2: If you have served notice on a tenant or contact holder and they have not complied by leaving the property by the specified date, court proceedings must be issued. In certain cases, court proceedings can be issued via an accelerated procedure and a court hearing is therefore not always required; instead, a Judge will review all tenancy documentation and make a decision on that basis.

Our team are able to draft and issue court proceedings to ensure all of the correct evidence is included. We can also offer expert representation in court if a court hearing is required. Please note that we can also ask the court to make an order for the tenant or contract holder to pay some, sometimes all, of your legal costs at this stage.

Stage 3: Once court proceedings have been issued and a possession order has been obtained, the tenant or contract holder will have a specific time period to vacate the property as ordered by the court (usually 14 days). If the tenant or contract holder fails to vacate the property, it will be necessary to make an additional application to the court to enforce the possession order via county court bailiffs or high court sheriffs.

Fixed Fees

We are committed to complete transparency with our pricing; please see below fixed fees for our services in relation to stage 1, 2 and 3 as detailed above.

Stage 1:

Drafting and Serving Notice to a tenant or contract holder: £150.00 + VAT

Stage 2:

Issuing court proceedings with a view of obtaining a Possession Order: £600.00 + VAT

Court fee: £355.00

Representation at Court if necessary: £126.00 + VAT per hour

Stage 3:

Request for Warrant application (County Court Bailiffs): £250.00 + VAT

Court fee: £130.00

Additional Services

In addition to our fixed fees detailed above, we also offer the below services:

Consultation: £150.00 + VAT

If you wish to discuss your situation with an expert member of the team, we are able to offer a consultation to assess your position and build a strategy to achieve your desired outcome. Consultations can be arranged to take place remotely via telephone or Teams if you are not local to our offices in Swansea, Pontypridd and Talbot Green.

Notice Validity Checker: £100.00 + VAT

This service is for those who wish to serve Notice independently but seek reassurance from our expert team to confirm the notice served is valid and enforceable if necessary. Please note that there are time limitations and your notice will not remain valid endlessly; we therefore recommend seeking legal advice as soon as possible to ensure costly delays are avoided.

If you seek our advice, assistance or reassurance, please do not hesitate to contact our Dispute Resolution team on 01792 455400 or by completing an enquiry form on our website.