An expert in property law is to hold a series of free clinics this month to help people with real estate problems.

Mathew Kelly, a director at Hamilton-based Chancery Legal, will hold the clinics on Saturday afternoons throughout March.

Mr Kelly, who has more than 15 years of experience in the field, said he could help people with questions on tenancy agreements, mortgages, the sale and purchase of property, lost title deeds and adding family members on to titles.

He added: “It’s just a new thing to give people access to legal services — I have been here a few months and I want to do my part. It’s just a bit of charitable work.

Mr Kelly, who recently joined Chancery after several years at Wakefield Quin, said: “Sometimes it’s just tenancy agreements and tenants trying to get their deposits back after they’ve ended their lease or people have lost their title deeds, which comes up quite a lot.

“There’s also buying and selling property.”

Mr Kelly agreed that the public’s view of lawyers was not always kind.

He said: “I’m very conscious of that and it’s an effort to change the public’s perception of lawyers.”

Mr Kelly added that a major problem on the island was inherited property left to decay as families could not agree on what to do with it.

He said: “This is a big problem, where you have got the parents leaving the property to several children. What tends to happen is they can’t agree what to do with the property. One may want to rent it, another sell and another might want to live in it. As a result, nothing gets agreed.

“You see empty properties all over the island simply because it hasn’t been dealt with properly. We can help in that regard.”

The free clinics will run on Saturday’s between 12 noon and 4pm at the firm’s Reid Street offices.

Mr Kelly said: “I’m proposing to let this run for a month just to see what the interest levels are.

“If it’s very busy, I will look at extending it.”

Anyone who wants to book an appointment should contact Chancery Legal on 295-3885.