Nine stages, in the order they happen. An Islamic home purchase plan runs on the same conveyancing track as any other purchase — quote, searches, enquiries, exchange, completion, registration — with the provider's acquisition documents running alongside it. Here is what happens at each stage, and who is waiting on whom.
Before you instruct anyone
Two things are worth settling first, because they decide how the rest of it goes.
The first is your finance. You will have an offer or an agreement in principle from an Islamic finance provider, and it will name a structure — usually Diminishing Musharaka or Ijara. That word determines what your solicitor registers at the end, so tell them at the quote stage, not later.
The second is whether the firm you are about to instruct can act for the provider as well as for you. If it can, the two halves of the transaction move together. If it cannot, you are paying two firms to wait for each other.
Day one — quote, ID and file open
You get an itemised fixed-fee quote in writing before any work starts. Accept it, complete your identity checks, and a named solicitor opens the file.
At this point we also confirm the position with your provider, so that nothing about panel membership or representation surfaces as a surprise in week four.
What we need from you: identification, your provider's details and the estate agent's memorandum of sale.
Weeks 1–2 — contract pack and searches
We request the contract pack from the seller's solicitor and order your searches — local authority, drainage and environmental as standard — then start working through the title.
This stage is identical to a conventional purchase. It is also, on most files, the longest single wait, because search turnaround is set by the local authority rather than by anyone in the transaction.
What we need from you: the search fees, and your patience.
Weeks 2–4 — enquiries, and the provider's pack
We raise enquiries with the seller's conveyancer on anything the title or the searches throw up. In parallel, the provider's documents arrive: the acquisition paperwork, the lease or co-ownership agreement, and the conditions that have to be satisfied before funds are released.
This is the point at which experience shows. The pack is not a mortgage offer and cannot be treated as one. A firm that knows the structures reads it, checks it against the title, and gets on with the enquiries at the same time.
Weeks 3–6 — the provider's side, squared
Islamic finance means the provider buys with you, so a lease or co-ownership agreement sits alongside the transfer. We handle their requirements and yours together, checking the four things that matter most on any plan:
- the exit terms — what early settlement costs, and what happens to the provider's share if you sell before the plan ends;
- who insures and maintains — the obligations the plan passes to you;
- how your share is protected — the registrations and restrictions that secure your growing stake at the Land Registry;
- leasehold layering — where the property is itself leasehold, three sets of obligations stack up and have to fit together.
The report to you — the stage that is genuinely different
On a conventional purchase your solicitor reports on title, searches, contract and mortgage offer. Here there is a fifth thing to explain: the structure itself. Rent, share, exit — in plain English, before you commit to it.
Insist on this. If you finish reading your report without knowing who holds the legal title during the plan, what your monthly payment is buying, and what it costs to leave early, the report has not done its job.
Exchange
Contracts are exchanged, your deposit moves, and the completion date is fixed. From that moment the deal binds both sides. Nothing about Islamic finance changes this — exchange is exchange.
Completion day
Funds move from the provider and from you, the seller's solicitor confirms receipt, and the keys are released. In a chain this runs up the line, which is why keys sometimes arrive in the afternoon rather than at ten in the morning.
After completion — Stamp Duty and registration
Two jobs finish the file, and both are the ones that carry the Islamic-finance difference.
We submit the Stamp Duty return and claim HMRC's alternative property finance relief, which exists so that buyers using these structures are not taxed twice on the same home. And we register the ownership structure correctly at the Land Registry — the transfer, the provider's interest, and the entries that protect your share.
Registration is quiet, unglamorous, and the thing most likely to cause you a problem years later if it is done carelessly. Land Registry timing is outside anyone's control, so it can run on for months after you have moved in. That is normal.
Where the time actually goes
Our fees page publishes a typical timescale of eight to fourteen weeks for a standard purchase. Almost none of that is the Islamic finance. It is searches, enquiries, and the chain.
The three things that genuinely speed a file up are the same for everyone: return signed paperwork the day it arrives, chase your finance offer instead of waiting for it, and answer your solicitor's questions immediately. Our Sharia-compliant home purchase service is built around the other half of that bargain — a named solicitor, a direct line, and milestone updates so you are never the one chasing us.
For what to ask before you pick a firm, see the three questions to ask a halal mortgage solicitor. If this is your first purchase, what your solicitor needs from a first-time buyer covers the documents and the order we ask for them.
Questions people ask
Does a home purchase plan take longer than a normal mortgage?
It should not. The finance documents run alongside the purchase rather than after it. Where these purchases do run long, the cause is almost always a firm working through the structures for the first time, not the structures themselves.
When do I actually own the property?
It depends on the structure, and it is the question worth asking your solicitor before you sign rather than after. The short answer for each structure — and what the register shows while the plan runs — is in what a halal mortgage does to your title deeds.
What if the chain collapses after I have paid for searches?
Search fees are usually gone: they have been paid to the search providers and the reports have their own validity windows and reliance terms, so they are not simply transferable to your next property. Some can be reused on a second attempt at the same property. Ask us at the quote stage what we charge for our own work if a purchase does not complete, so you know before you need to.
Can I use a home purchase plan on a leasehold flat?
Yes, and it is common — but it is the situation where the legal work is heaviest, because the plan's lease has to sit properly underneath the existing one. Expect the quote to reflect that, and expect the report to spend time on it.
Shah leads the firm’s Islamic finance work and its CQS accreditation, and has completed halal purchases with every major UK provider.
This article is general information, not legal advice. For advice on your own matter, make an enquiry — it's free and confidential.