Established: 1989

Location: N/A

Contact Name: Teresa Shaw

Website: www.hometransfer.nz

Business mission and vision:
Our missing is to provide low cost property legal transactions for our clients. We don’t have any hidden fees and are upfront with our costs. We are honest and open with our clients which enables us to provide a full service to them.

We are Property Lawyers who handle conveyancing matters (buying and selling homes) for clients. We offer a fixed fee upfront which gives clients peace of mind throughout the process to allow them to budget and be informed. We can manage settlements right throughout New Zealand by phone, email and zoom calls. We use as simple language as possible for our clients and make them feel apart of the process. We love for our clients to enjoy the purchase of their new home.

What set’s us apart is our amazing team who work well together and we gain a rapport with our clients with our friendly nature. We want our clients to not feel like they are going into a law office so that they can enjoy the experience and feel more relaxed. We don’t charge for each phone call or email they send and with out set fee schedule clients are comfortable to contact us when they feel like they need reassurance.
Conveyancing is incredible up and down, it depends on so many factors, election year, the economy, house prices, interest rates and most recently Covid all have played a part in how much work we have or don’t have. We can go from one week of having 40-50 contracts come in to the next week 10-15 – so the main challenge for us is keeping a consistent amount of work for the current staff and managing the down times effectively.
I think Covid would have to be the biggest challenge. When we heard we were going into level 4 in two days back in March – Steve and I spoke on the phone and Steve was speechless. For me – it was about planning for the staff – what do we do right at that minute – we organised for the staff to all take a computer home that day and to be able to log in from home. We were aware staff didn’t have computers so this was the best solution for us. And luckily the weeks prior we had also prepared for remote log in. One major challenge that would have stood in our way was solved for us back in 2015 when we went electronic with our files – which meant now working from home we had everything on the computer available to us without having to worry about physical files. For us this was a small challenge that we had already in the back ground prepared for. Staff were still able to be keep working, allow clients to complete their settlements in the 2 days of Level 3 we had and we also kept paying them 100% of their wage.
Home Transfer Centre has always been well known for their fucky little tune we had on the radio that would get stuck in your head! We have often struggled with keeping staff as we only really have the one part of law being property law so younger lawyers and Legal Executives often come in and gain experience then find they want to get their fingers into more Law and leave for another law firm. We often find that we have staff turn over of the younger ones and then we re-hire and spend the time training them and the same thing happens. Which for them is great as they are doing what is best for them but it leaves us short each time. That would be our biggest perseverance is staffing and having the right mix and numbers for the work we have.
Year after year we gain more and more confidence with agents and clients and we keep growing which I think for a property law firm that is really good. We also have achieved growth within the firm by over the last 5 years going from 7 staff to 14 at present.
What we are most proud of is that Home Transfer Centre that started with a small business in 1989 in Dunedin has two Auckland based successful offices as well. We have gone from strength to strength with the two Auckland offices and have even had staff who have left returned because they loved the way we do things here. We are different to how we run the office to other normal main stream law firms but it works for us.
We like to employ people that have not experience and train them up – I mean we all have to start somewhere and we like to give those people a chance. IT makes it harder for us to be constantly training people but it works for us.
Quick, professional and helpful service! Will be using these guys for our real estate transactions in the future. The first time I haven’t had to chase up a conveyancing lawyer and the first time our settlements is done first thing in the morning 🙂 Like

Excellent service. Dealt with numerous staff during the buying and selling process and all were all polite and promptly returned all calls and emails. Couldn’t have asked for better and by far the best law firm we have ever dealt with.

I have purchased 2 properties using the fantastic team at HTC Dunedin and could not recommend them highly enough. They helped me to get my kiwisaver and the homestart grant in a prompt timely fashion that did not leave my feeling like I may have missed out as other people I know did at the time due to using regular lawyers not a team of dedicated professionals

Excellent Service at a fantastic price. Thank you so much you made it so easy

(All from Google Reviews)

We often sponsor schools and children’s activities who may have disabilities by donating and giving them a fun afternoon ten pin bowling or swimming
We are always trying to keep our business area tidy so often call the Council when there is glass, or rubbish laying around our streets. We don’t like seeing this and know that people walking the streets and clients don’t want to see this either.

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