A charge put on property

lindens

I would like people's advice as to what they think i should do (if anything) regarding this situation.
In Feb this year i separated from my husband and we sold our house to a relative. At the time I had defaulted on an A&L loan in my name and there is a CCJ for which I am making payments. In March April and May i missed payments and they said they were going to put a charge on the property. I wasn't worried as I knew it would be sold within days. It was sold on Fri 10 June. They managed to put a charge on the property on sat 11th June. Now the land registry will only remove the charge if the conditions are met ie I pay it all off (£16000). The A&L will only remove the charge if the conditions are met cos as far as they are concerned the house is still in my name.The land registry can't change the name to the new owner because of the charge.
The new owners building society is getting funny now as they can't get the deeds because they are still in my name. The solicitor on behalf of the new owner is going to get done for negilgance (? or some such term can't remember if thats right).
Now I am of the opinion that the only person at fault here is the solicitor for not applying to the land registry on the date of sale to change the name. Apparantly there was a 12 hour window in the changeover process and A&L managed to put the charge in, in that window. I was uptodate with the payments by July and am now ahead of myself so thats OK. It doesn't affect me, cos I can't get a mortgage at the moment anyway cos of my debts. My ex - hubby says it' s stopping him getting a mortgage which i find hard to belive.
Any ideas or opinions welcome!!!!
thanx

[Deleted User]

The solicitor for the person buying your house may just be getting grief from his client because the charging order was put on hours after property was 'sold' - meaning there may be delay.

When you say 'sold' do you mean you are at the stage of 'exchange of contracts' or do you mean 'final completion'.

At the 'exchange of contracts' stage - neither party can back out so your buyers will still get the property.

The charging order has more implications for you than them. If you have exchanged contracts - you are now obliged to sell the house for what you have agreed - and you will get back that amount minus the amount on the charging order and any outstanding mortgage.

The deeds do not switch names until 'completion' (but I could be wrong here...)

It will stop ex hubby from getting a mortgage if he is still tied to yours - or if he is relying on money from the sale as part of settlement.

lindens

By sold i mean completed. the solicitor says the property is not legally mine anymore, it belongs to the relative who bought it. But our names are still showing as owners on the land registry because of the charge on the property. So they want to switch the deeds over but can't.
We each had the money from the sale on 10th june, without the loan charge being taken into account as it wasnt applied for until the next day the 11th.

crossleydd42

I'm not an absolute expert on this, but I understood that it was not possible to put a charge on a property in joint names if only one of the owners was the reason for the charge.

Tim_L

When you say the only person at fault is the solicitor, you're playing a bit fast and loose with the truth. In fact you are at fault, firstly for defaulting on the debt and then for trying to push the sale through before a charge was placed on the house and "not being worried" about making payments because you knew what was coming. If you have made money from the sale then you are in a position to clear your debts and should do so.

This has more implications than a straightforward question of your own personal conscience. Ultimately, if this costs people money (the relative, the solicitor, and the building society) they are going to come after you for it.

lindens

I meant that the person at fault for this charge fiasco at present, is the solicitor.
Obviously i am at fault for defaulting on the loan. And the money from the sale did go to paying off debts but did not cover them all.
I didn't push the sale through, and we didn't know they had managed to put the charge on until August.
They can certainly try and come after me for money, but they won't get very far, the "only" thing i have done wrong is get into debt, which i am now paying off.

Bossyboots

The solicitor could be at fault here as it sounds like they had not registered a priority application (can't remember exactly what its called) which would mean they would be alerted to any applications for registration against the property and equally the Land Registry would know there was a sale going through.

However, the OP admits she knew about the potential charge and had a duty to notify the solicitors dealing with the property of this. If the solicitor's file is in order and A&L have exploited a loophole, then I agree with Tim that the new owner will have recourse against the OP and infact may well have anyway for completing with the knowledge that someone was planning to charge the property.

How this all works out will depend on what paperwork was done when but I do think the OP may find this one comes back on her and no-one else. I presume the relative's solicitor has now placed a caution on the property so that the OP cannot try to sell it to someone else which, as it stands at the moment, she could.

Perhaps an explanation of what the solicitor is alleged to have done wrong will make things clearer as to where responsibility will lie and possible solutions.