Conveyancer or solicitor: which one do you actually need?

Most Victorian property sales and purchases can be handled start to finish by a licensed conveyancer. Some cannot. The dividing line is not how expensive your property is. It is whether the work sits inside a defined category the law calls conveyancing work.

Here is where that line falls, and how to tell which side you are on before you sign.

The short answer

If you are buying or selling a house in Cranbourne, a unit in Lynbrook, a block in Clyde North or an off the plan lot in Botanic Ridge, a licensed conveyancer can do the whole job. Contract review, duty, title searches, settlement, the lot.

If your matter involves a dispute, a court order, a trust, a company structure or a deceased estate, you need a solicitor, and sometimes an accountant as well. That is not a hedge. A conveyancer who took that work on would be breaking the law.

What a licensed conveyancer actually is

A Victorian licensed conveyancer is not "a lawyer who does property". It is a separate profession with its own qualification, its own licence and its own regulator, set up under the Conveyancers Act 2006. That Act is current: version 022 has been in force since 9 September 2026.

The Victorian Legal Services Board + Commissioner, which regulates lawyers, puts it plainly. Some Australian laws allow people who are not legal practitioners to provide limited legal services, and registered conveyancers are on that list, alongside accountants and migration agents. The same page sets the limit. A person may commit an offence if they advertise, represent, state or imply to others that they can provide legal services when they are not qualified to do so, and engaging in unqualified legal practice carries a maximum penalty of up to two years' imprisonment and/or a fine. A conveyancer's authority is real, and it is bounded.

How you get the licence

The requirements to hold an individual conveyancer's licence in Victoria are set out by Consumer Affairs Victoria. You need:

1. The Advanced Diploma of Conveyancing from the Business Services Training Package (Version 7.0), or a recognised earlier version.
2. Twelve months' full time experience carrying out conveyancing work within the last five years, supervised by a legal practitioner or another licensed conveyancer.
3. A minimum of $2 million professional indemnity insurance through the current approved broker.

The licence itself is granted by the Business Licensing Authority, and it runs on until it is surrendered, suspended, disqualified or cancelled.

Who polices it

This is where people get confused, so it is worth being exact. Conveyancers are licensed by the Business Licensing Authority and regulated by Consumer Affairs Victoria. Lawyers are regulated by the Victorian Legal Services Board + Commissioner. Two separate systems, with separate complaints paths.

Conveyancers work under the Conveyancers (Professional Conduct) Regulations 2018. One rule matters more than any other when you are choosing who to hire: a conveyancer must only accept instructions to perform conveyancing work if they are competent to perform it. The same regulations require a conveyancer to stop acting for everyone in a transaction if a conflict of interest arises.

Side by side

When you genuinely need a solicitor

Something has gone wrong and you want to enforce it

The vendor will not settle. A neighbour is claiming your fence sits two metres inside their boundary. Once a matter becomes a dispute that might end up in front of a tribunal or a court, it is litigation, and litigation is lawyers' work.

The Magistrates' Court of Victoria hears civil disputes up to $100,000 arising from debts, claims for damages, other monetary disputes or equitable relief. Larger claims are heard in a higher court. A conveyancer cannot run that for you. They cannot appear at a hearing, and they cannot draft the documents that start a proceeding.

A trust, a company or a super fund is buying

Whose name goes on the title is a structuring decision with tax consequences that outlast the settlement by decades. Family trust, unit trust, company as trustee, self managed super fund: each one has its own rules about what it can buy and how it must be funded.

Talk to a solicitor and your accountant before you sign a contract, not after. Once the structure is settled and the contract is signed correctly, a conveyancer can take the transaction from there.

A deceased estate

If the person who died owned real estate, either on their own or as a tenant in common, the Supreme Court of Victoria says a grant is always required. A grant of probate or letters of administration is what lets an executor or administrator sell or transfer that property at all.

Getting the grant is estate work. The Supreme Court says you do not need a lawyer to apply, though the Probate Office cannot give you legal advice or tell you how to administer the estate. If there is any question about the will's validity or a possible claim against the estate, use a solicitor. Once the grant is in hand, the transfer or sale that follows is ordinary ownership transfer work that a conveyancer handles.

A separation

The State Revenue Office does allow a duty exemption for a transfer made solely because of the breakdown of a marriage or domestic relationship, under section 44 of the Duties Act 2000. The conditions are tight. There can be a maximum of two transferees, and everyone on both sides of the transfer must be a person rather than a company or a trust.

But the exemption sits at the end of the process, not the start. Working out who gets what, and recording it in consent orders or a binding financial agreement, is family law, and you need a family lawyer for it. Bring us the orders or the agreement and we can lodge the transfer.

Tax and duty structuring

There is a real difference between lodging duty and minimising it. A conveyancer lodges what the State Revenue Office requires for the transaction you have actually entered into. Rearranging your affairs to change the duty or capital gains outcome is advice for a tax lawyer or your accountant.

When a conveyancer is the right call

Which is, honestly, most of the time. The South East Melbourne growth corridor runs on straightforward transactions: a first home in Cranbourne East, an upgrade in Berwick, a house and land package in Clyde, an investor selling a townhouse in Narre Warren.

For all of those, the work is contract and section 32 review, title and planning searches, duty, adjustments and an electronic settlement. That is squarely conveyancing work on a purchase, and a licensed conveyancer does it every working day. If you want the contract looked at before you sign or bid, contract review is a standalone piece of work, and a problem found before you are bound is a far easier problem to deal with.

Victorian conveyancing is fully electronic, so where your conveyancer sits matters less than it used to. Being local still helps when you want to meet the person actually handling your settlement.

What about cost

Whoever you hire, you are entitled to know the cost before you commit. Victorian conveyancers must disclose costs in writing before or at the time they are retained, or as soon as possible afterwards, including the amount if it is known or the basis of calculation if it is not, and how and when you will be invoiced.

That obligation has teeth. If the disclosure is not made before or at the time of the retainer, the client is not required to pay the costs at all. Ask for it in writing up front, and compare what is included rather than the headline number.

How to check anyone before you hire them

Do this before you hand over a contract. It takes about three minutes.

• For a conveyancer, search the public register of licensed conveyancers at registers.consumer.vic.gov.au. It lists the licensee's name, licence number, licence type, business names, business address and any conditions on the licence.
• For a lawyer, check they hold a current Australian practising certificate through the Victorian Legal Services Board + Commissioner register.
• Ask about professional indemnity cover. Every licensed Victorian conveyancer must carry it.
• Be wary of anyone who blurs the two. A business that is not a law practice cannot advertise or imply that it is entitled to engage in legal practice.

Common questions

Is a conveyancer cheaper than a solicitor?

It depends on the firm and on the matter, so anyone offering a confident general answer is guessing. What you can rely on is the written disclosure: Victorian conveyancers have to tell you the cost, or the basis for working it out, before or at the time you retain them. Price is also the wrong first question. Ask instead whether the person you hire can lawfully do everything your matter needs, because a quote from someone who has to hand half the file to a lawyer is not the whole cost.

Can a conveyancer review my contract of sale and section 32 statement?

Yes. Reviewing the contract and the vendor statement, raising problems with the agent or the vendor's representative, and explaining what you are agreeing to is core conveyancing work. If the review turns up something that needs a lawyer, such as a caveat linked to a dispute or an unusual restriction, a conveyancer should tell you that plainly and point you to one.

What happens if my conveyancer hits something they cannot do?

They have to tell you. The professional conduct rules only allow a conveyancer to accept instructions for conveyancing work they are competent to perform, and there is a separate duty to stop acting for all parties if a conflict of interest arises. A good conveyancer flags the issue early and refers you on rather than pressing ahead.

Not sure which one you need? Ask.

If you are holding a contract and you are not sure whether your situation is ordinary or complicated, send it through and we will tell you. If it is conveyancing work, we can help. If it needs a solicitor, we will say so and point you in the right direction.

Wise Step Conveyancing is at Office 4, Level 1, 105A High Street, Cranbourne, open Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm, and available on weekends by appointment. Ask us for a quote or get in touch with a question first. We are members of the Australian Institute of Conveyancers (Victoria Division) and professional indemnity insured.

This article is general information about Victorian conveyancing and is not legal advice for your particular transaction. Speak to us about your specific circumstances.