I think I might make a good solicitor. I don’t know much about law and that but I think I can remember the basics. Though shalt not do bad stuff etc.
I have a solicitor at the moment who was trying to explain to me the reasons why a property I am buying should be freehold, leasehold or possibly (it’s complicated) a bit of both. He spent about 40 minutes saying lots of words. The sentences felt like a combination of the same words each time in a slightly different order. “You can’t do this because of that but if you speak to whoever the whatever might happen.” Then next “You speak to whoever because the whatever might happen but you can’t do this” etc.
After 40 minutes I told him he might as well have been speaking in Chinese. He wasn’t very impressed.
Later I spoke to someone from the bank who said “That part of the building cannot be freehold because to be freehold it has to be touching the Earth.” Instantly I got it. It took one person one sentence and roughly 10 seconds to say the thing the solicitor had spent 40 minutes not saying. I’ve decided that this is why they charge you by the hour. Initially I thought it was a simple miscommunication. It isn’t it’s entirely on purpose that they confuse you and have to spend more time explaining, because it goes towards their hourly rate. Grrr.