Hi there,
We had a bit accepted on a house a while ago, and plumped for one of those 900 euro + VAT solicitors to handle the contracts for us. We had signed the contracts, sent the deposit to our solicitor and were waiting for the vendors to sign.
Unfortunately, the vendors decided they didn't want to sell the house after all (but didn't tell anyone - we had to chase them up ourselves through the auctioneer, they didn't even tell their own solicitor). But on top of the disappointment of not getting the house we really wanted, we have just received a bill from our solicitor for 400 euro.