For conveyancers & solicitors
When a client asks what happens if their buyer pulls out, you’ll have an answer.
A guarantee that your client’s sale completes — even if their buyer doesn’t.
ClozeSure is a completion guarantee for sellers of residential property in England and Wales. For a modest option fee — secured at exchange, with the option of paying on exchange or on completion — we contract to buy your client's home for 90% of their agreed sale price if their buyer fails to complete. With the buyer's forfeited 10% deposit, your client receives 100% of their sale price, in time for their onward move to stay on track. It is the first protection of its kind.
Not insurance. Not a loan. A watertight property purchase option contract — enforceable only by your client, giving them certainty of their sale from the moment they exchange.
The problem
When a buyer fails after exchange, it lands on your desk.
Your client has exchanged. Contracts are signed, the completion date is fixed, the removals are booked. Then, on completion day, the buyer doesn't complete. You serve a valid Notice to Complete — but if the buyer still fails, the sale is over and the contract is rescinded. The chain collapses, the onward purchase falls with it, and your client is left with the loss, the delay and the distress — and the prospect of their own seller's onward costs cascading down the chain.
The risk is small. When it happens, the damage is great.
Photo: Mikhail Pavstyuk / Unsplash
"I can now appreciate that although these matters happen rarely, when they do, they cause untold worry and difficulty for all concerned."
Rose Davis — Managing Director, Davis & Co Property Lawyers
How our guarantee works
Your client keeps their price — and their move.
Your client applies for ClozeSure on, or before exchange. If their buyer then defaults and your client instructs us by triggering their option, we complete the purchase of their property for 90% of its agreed sale price. The buyer's forfeited 10% deposit makes up the difference giving your client 100%.
Because most sellers are buying an onward property of their own, ClozeSure completes our own purchase of your client's home the moment it can legally be sold to us — the same day the buyer's deadline passes and the original sale contract is rescinded — so the related transaction up the chain can complete too. Your client doesn't simply recover their money; they keep their onward move.
It is a cleaner outcome all round. Your client doesn't have to wait to re-market and resell — ClozeSure completes straight away, which keeps the wider chain from breaking. Because your client receives their full sale price, there would be no need for them to pursue the buyer for the far larger losses a collapse would otherwise cause: the buyer's exposure is limited to the 10% deposit they forfeit — plus, at most, some interest and legal costs. Better for your client, and fairer to the buyer who defaulted.
Photo: Olha Vilkha / Unsplash
Step by step
Where you come in.
The timing is what makes it work — so here is the full chronology, from exchange through the failed completion day to the day everything completes.
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Exchange — and your client buys ClozeSure
Your client purchases ClozeSure around their date of exchange — up to 30 days before or two days after, with the option of paying on or before exchange by card, or irrevocably as a disbursement from completion monies. From exchange, their agreed sale price is guaranteed.
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Completion day: the buyer fails, and you serve a Notice to Complete
If the buyer doesn’t complete, you serve the usual 10-day Notice to Complete, exactly as you would today. Each seller up the chain does the same — and, importantly, you serve yours on the buyer before your client’s own seller serves theirs, so the notices expire in the right order.
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The same day, your client triggers ClozeSure
Your client triggers now — on the failed completion day itself, allowing us to immediately begin our due diligence and conveyancing. Because we valued the property and accepted its price when your client first applied, there is no revaluation and no renegotiation — we simply adopt the same sales terms.
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Day 10: the Notice to Complete expires
If the buyer still hasn’t completed when the 10 days are up, they’re in breach. The contract is rescinded and they forfeit their 10% deposit, which passes to your client.
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The same day, within hours: ClozeSure completes
We can complete when the buyer’s Notice has expired — until then, the property can’t be sold to anyone else. So the moment we are legally able, we complete our purchase at 90% — within hours, before your client’s own seller’s Notice expires later that day.
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Your client’s onward purchase completes — same day
With the funds received, your client completes their onward purchase that same day. The chain holds.
What ClozeSure is — and isn’t.
What it is
ClozeSure is a property purchase option — a binding commitment to immediately buy your client’s property if their buyer defaults after exchange. They still receive 100% of their agreed sale price.
What it isn’t
Not insurance. No policy, no insurable-interest test. It’s a contract, not cover. ClozeSure prevents the loss — your client's sale completes regardless.
Not a loan. No borrowing, no interest, nothing to repay. Your client takes on no debt.
Not a forced sale. The option to oblige us to acquire their property is your client’s alone — if their buyer completes, ClozeSure simply steps aside.
Not subject to a fresh valuation. We buy on the original sale terms your client agreed at application — no revaluation, no renegotiation.
Photo: Jakub Żerdzicki / Unsplash
Where you come in
A solution worth telling clients about.
Post-exchange failures are no longer a risk you can only warn your clients about — for the first time, there is a solution.
Many firms already raise risks and protections like title and indemnity insurance in the client questionnaire — a rare risk, but one clients should be told they can cover. ClozeSure belongs in the same place. It isn't insurance — it's an option contract — but the reflex is identical: include the risk of buyer failure in your questionnaire, and leave the choice with your client. A single line is enough.
When the buyer fails on completion day, you serve the Notice to Complete and at the same time, trigger ClozeSure. Tell us, and give reasonable assistance to our conveyancers — ClozeSure runs its own purchase, so you're never doing our conveyancing.
There's no referral fee and no commission — nothing that could place your independence in question. Our hope is simply that no seller loses their home and their onward move because a buyer walked away, when, for the first time, there is now a solution.
The strength behind our guarantee
When we guarantee a sale, the funds are already there.
A commitment to complete is only as strong as the money behind it — and it's the question any conveyancer will want answered before their client relies on it. So, plainly:
The funds to buy your client's property are arranged before the guarantee is ever issued — never raised after a buyer fails. ClozeSure is backed by a multi-million-pound facility from a syndicate of financial institutions led by Together — one of the UK's established specialist lenders — which also includes easyMoney and Pallas Capital, alongside our own underwritten financial strength. When your client triggers the guarantee, we aren't raising finance — we already hold it, ready to complete within hours of the Notice to Complete expiring.
We only stand behind sales we know we can complete. Before ClozeSure is offered on any property, our valuation checks and referral process confirm it qualifies — so every agreement in force is one we are funded and ready to honour. We don't find the money when a buyer fails; we have it before we ever make the promise.
In partnership with
When ClozeSure applies
Qualifying at a glance.
- Residential property in England and Wales
- Sold with vacant possession
- An unconditional contract
- An arm's length sale between an unconnected buyer and seller
- The usual 10% deposit paid on exchange
- Completion within three months of exchange
- A standard 10-day Notice to Complete
CPD training
When Buyers Fail to Complete
A short module on the legal, financial and reputational risk when a buyer fails after exchange — and the options now open to your clients.
Members of
As featured in
For your practice
Read the detail.
- A Guide to ClozeSure for Solicitors & Conveyancers (PDF) → The full mechanism, key terms and step-by-step chronology — the reference to keep for a live case. Download PDF ↓
- A seller's options when a buyer fails (Table) → Every alternative — bridging, iBuyer, falling through — and its cost, side by side.
Photo: Tanya Barrow / Unsplash
Give your clients certainty after exchange.
The CPD training takes you through the legal, financial and reputational risks when a buyer fails after exchange — and how ClozeSure resolves them — so you can raise the subject with clients confidently.
Register your interest to keep up to date with our service, and for practical notes on flagging the risk of buyer failure in your client questionnaire. Neither commits you to anything.
Frequently Asked Questions for Conveyancers
No, they are not obliged to sell their property to ClozeSure and are free to keep their property or sell it to another party.
ClozeSure is a Purchase Option Agreement granted by us to the property seller, that obligates us, if triggered by the seller, to acquire the property in the event that the seller’s contract of sale fails due to their buyer’s default.
No. ClozeSure is not a contract of insurance, nor an insurance company.
The ClozeSure Group is a well funded property company who aim to acquire and profit from the ownership of saleable residential properties in England and Wales.
ClozeSure is a Purchase Option Agreement, where the seller has the option to oblige (or not) ClozeSure to purchase their property for 90% of their agreed sale price in the event that their buyer pulls out following exchange of contracts (forfeiting their deposit).
If your client's buyer has failed to complete on the contractual completion date, it is assumed you will be instructed to serve a Notice to Complete. This is the point at which your client must trigger the ClozeSure guarantee.
This is so that the ClozeSure solicitors can immediately undertake the necessary due diligence and prepare the appropriate paperwork to effect a transfer to ClozeSure if your client's buyer fails to complete within the relevant Notice period.
You will need to send a full conveyancing pack to the ClozeSure solicitors and respond promptly to any enquiries they may raise and, of course, you will need to approve the relevant transfer paperwork. How you document your relationship with your client is entirely a matter for you in terms of client care letters, etc. but you may wish to make provision for any additional costs you may incur in dealing with the ClozeSure solicitors.
ClozeSure's solicitors will be instructed to use all reasonable efforts to achieve completion of your client's property (for 90% of the original purchase price) immediately after the Notice to Complete has lapsed (assuming the original buyer fails to complete).
