What a settlement agent actually does in Perth

In most of Australia you would call them a conveyancer. In Western Australia they are a settlement agent, and if you are buying or selling here, you will appoint one. Buyers appoint their own. Sellers appoint their own. They are the people who take a signed contract and turn it into a change of ownership on the title.

Most people meet their settlement agent once, by email, and never quite work out what they did for the money. So here is the plain version.

What a settlement agent actually is

A settlement agent in Western Australia holds a licence under the Settlement Agents Act 1981, issued by Consumer Protection. It is not a title anyone can adopt. To trade, the business needs a licence and a current triennial certificate, it must carry professional indemnity insurance of at least $250,000, it must hold client money in a statutory trust account, and the licensee must complete continuing professional development every year. There is a Settlement Agents Code of Conduct sitting over the top of all of it.

That licensing is the reason the job exists as a separate profession here. Money and title documents pass through their hands, so the trust account rules and the insurance are not paperwork, they are the whole point.

What they do between contract and keys

The scope of work is set out by Consumer Protection, and it is broader than most sellers realise.

They search

• The certificate of title, and any dealings, caveats, mortgages, easements or restrictive covenants recorded on it
• Local government rates, water rates, land tax and any other outgoings, obtained direct from the authorities
• For a strata lot, the strata company, for the levy position and the certificate a buyer is entitled to

They prepare and check documents

Transfer documents, requisitions on title, statutory declarations, powers of attorney where needed, and the settlement statement that sets out exactly who pays what on the day.

They do the arithmetic

Rates, water, land tax and strata levies are all apportioned between seller and buyer. This is where the adjustments happen, and it is the reason a settlement figure is never simply the purchase price minus the deposit.

They handle duty and registration

Transfer duty is assessed and paid through them, and the transfer is lodged for registration so the buyer ends up on the certificate of title.

They settle

Almost all WA settlements now happen electronically, through an Electronic Lodgement Network, with the banks, both settlement agents and the lodgement all lined up on the same screen at the same minute. Nobody meets in a car park with a bank cheque any more, but somebody still has to make every party ready by the appointed time, and that is the job.

How settlement actually happens now

Settlement used to be a meeting. Two settlement agents and the banks sat down together, swapped a bank cheque for a paper title, and that was that. It is not done that way any more.

Almost every settlement in Western Australia is now completed electronically, inside a shared online file called a Workspace hosted by an Electronic Lodgement Network Operator (an ELNO). Your settlement agent, the other side’s settlement agent, your bank and the other party’s bank all sign in to the same Workspace. Documents are signed digitally, the figures are locked in, and at the appointed time the money moves and the transfer is lodged with Landgate in the one transaction.

Two ELNOs operate in Western Australia: PEXA (Property Exchange Australia), which has run here since 2014, and Sympli, approved from January 2022. PEXA carries most of the volume, which is why you will hear people say “PEXA” when they mean electronic settlement generally. Apple Settlements put it plainly on their own site: “Most settlements now occur digitally using PEXA, where all parties complete and sign documentation online.”

This is not optional for the documents that matter. Landgate has required transfers, mortgages, discharges of mortgage, caveats and withdrawals of caveat to be lodged electronically since 1 December 2018. Paper is accepted only where a document genuinely cannot go through an electronic lodgement network, and a request to accept paper lodgement is attached. In Landgate’s words, “Not being an existing ELN Subscriber is not an acceptable reason to prepare and lodge an eligible document in paper.”

What that changes for you

You will be asked to verify your identity and to sign a client authorisation before your settlement agent can act for you inside the Workspace. Do that in the first week. It is the most common cause of a late scramble.

Your bank details matter more than they used to, because sale proceeds are transferred electronically rather than handed over as a cheque. Give your account details to your settlement agent in person or by phone, and never act on bank details that arrive by email without ringing the sender on a number you already had.

The clock is more precise. Under the 2022 General Conditions, settlement occurs at the moment the Workspace records the exchange of funds. If it has not settled by the closing time on the settlement date, the contract requires settlement on the next business day and time remains of the essence. The contract also protects both sides where the delay is nobody’s fault: there is no default if a Workspace problem, or an inoperative Landgate, Office of State Revenue, ELNO or Reserve Bank system, is what stopped it.

The contract sets out who drives, too. The buyer or the buyer’s settlement agent creates the Workspace, invites the seller’s side and the financial institutions, and nominates the settlement time. If they have not done so by 10 business days before settlement, the seller may create it instead. A party who wants to withdraw from electronic settlement must give notice no later than 5 business days beforehand, and the settlement date can be extended by up to 5 business days to accommodate that.

Why your contract has an annexure about the Transfer of Land Act

Look at a REIWA Offer and Acceptance today and condition 3 incorporates “the 2022 General Conditions together with the Annexure of Changes to the 2022 General Conditions Caused by changes to the transfer of Land Act 1893”. Sellers and buyers ask what that annexure is doing there.

The Joint Form of General Conditions in use now was published in May 2022. On 7 August 2023 the Transfer of Land Amendment Act 2022 commenced and changed the land titles system underneath it. In Landgate’s words, “Duplicate Titles have been removed from WA’s land titling system and will no longer be created or issued.” A paper duplicate title someone still holds has no legal effect, and there is no need to return it or destroy it. The same amendments allowed the Registrar of Titles and the Commissioner of Titles to serve statutory notices electronically, and clarified how counterpart documents are treated where an electronic version and a paper version of the same document differ in minor ways, such as a wet signature against a digital one.

That left the 2022 General Conditions referring to a document that no longer exists. Clause 3.10(a)(1) required the seller to hand the duplicate certificate of title to the buyer at settlement. Clause 3.11 dealt with the case where no duplicate had issued. Clause 26.1 defined the term. Rather than reissue the whole document, REIWA published a short annexure (form 198, dated 08/23) which deletes clause 3.10(a)(1), deletes clause 3.11, and deletes the definition of “Duplicate Certificate of Title”.

So the working position is simple. Your contract is the 2022 General Conditions as amended by that annexure. A seller does not produce a paper title at settlement, because there is nothing to produce. Proof of ownership is the certificate of title Landgate holds, and the register is the record. If an old duplicate title turns up in a deceased estate or a box of settlement papers, it is a keepsake, not a document anyone needs.

Two things worth checking. First, that the annexure is actually attached to the contract you are signing, and listed with the other annexures on the front page. Second, that any special condition someone has written by hand does not quietly reinstate an obligation to produce a title. A settlement agent reading the contract early will pick up both, which is one more reason to appoint one when you sign rather than in week three.

What they do not do

A settlement agent is not your lawyer. They can prepare and lodge the documents the transaction needs, but if there is a dispute, a caveat fight, a family court order with complications, or a contract that has gone properly wrong, that is legal advice and it belongs with a solicitor. A good settlement agent will tell you that early rather than late.

They also cannot act for both sides of the same transaction unless both parties acknowledge it and agree in advance.

When you should appoint one

The moment the contract is signed. Everything in a settlement runs on a clock: finance dates, duty assessment, searches that take as long as the authority takes, and a settlement date that was agreed before anyone checked whether it was realistic. Appointing early is the single cheapest thing a seller or a buyer can do to make settlement uneventful.

Strata makes this more work, not less

If the property is a lot in a strata or survey-strata scheme, the settlement agent has extra ground to cover. The levy position has to come from the strata company, not from the seller’s memory, because unpaid contributions can follow the lot to the new owner. Reserve fund levies are adjusted differently to ordinary levies. Any by-law change between contract and settlement may need to be notified to the buyer.

This is exactly why we build a strata information pack before a property goes to market. A settlement agent who receives the by-laws, the minutes, the accounts and the levy position on day one is not chasing them in week four.

If you want the detail, our strata series covers it: what unpaid levies mean at settlement, and what a seller must disclose before a buyer signs.

Who we recommend

We refer clients to Apple Settlements in Bedford. They are a licensed WA settlement agency, they work across the state, and they are straightforward to deal with, which matters more than anything on a settlement that has a wrinkle in it.

Apple Settlements, Unit 2, 1070 Beaufort Street, Bedford WA 6052. Phone 08 9371 0088, email [email protected], open Monday to Friday, 8.00am to 4.00pm. Their website is applesetts.com.au.

You are free to use any licensed settlement agent you like, and you should never feel steered. We recommend Apple because we have watched them do the work.

For the rest of what the contract requires of each side, penalty interest, key handover, inspection rights and default notices, see the questions buyers and sellers ask us about the 2022 General Conditions.

The short version

• A settlement agent is the licensed professional who turns a signed contract into a registered change of ownership
• Buyers and sellers each appoint their own
• They search, prepare documents, calculate the adjustments, handle duty, lodge for registration and run the settlement itself
• They are not a substitute for a solicitor when something is genuinely in dispute
• Appoint one the day the contract is signed
• Settlement is electronic, run through a PEXA or Sympli Workspace, so identity checks and the client authorisation need doing early
• Paper duplicate titles were abolished on 7 August 2023, which is why your contract carries an annexure amending the 2022 General Conditions
• Strata adds work, and a complete information pack up front removes most of it

This article is general information about how property settlement works in Western Australia. It is not legal advice. Licensing requirements are those published by Consumer Protection at the time of writing.

By James Yeoman, Director of KPR Perth Pty Ltd T/A Key Performance Real Estate