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Redrow won't let us out of Missives

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  • GDB2222
    GDB2222 Posts: 26,261 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Photogenic Name Dropper
    Trollfever wrote: »
    Land and property debt in Scotland lasts for 20 years before The Statute of Limitations kicks in.


    Gah! I just assumed it was 6 years like in England. Really ought to be a separate board for Scottish property questions! Do you have a reference for the 20 years by any chance?
    No reliance should be placed on the above! Absolutely none, do you hear?
  • Trollfever
    Trollfever Posts: 2,051 Forumite
    I stand to be corrected, but my understanding is that the OP has entered into a commercial contract to buy land and property from Redrow in Scotland.

    Redrow has 20 years to enforce the contract.

    The Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973
    http://www.opsi.gov.uk/RevisedStatutes/Acts/ukpga/1973/cukpga_19730052_en_2#pt1-pb1-l1g1

    The six year concession only relates to mortgage lenders.
  • GDB2222
    GDB2222 Posts: 26,261 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Photogenic Name Dropper
    Trollfever wrote: »
    I stand to be corrected, but my understanding is that the OP has entered into a commercial contract to buy land and property from Redrow in Scotland.

    Redrow has 20 years to enforce the contract.

    The Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973
    http://www.opsi.gov.uk/RevisedStatutes/Acts/ukpga/1973/cukpga_19730052_en_2#pt1-pb1-l1g1

    The six year concession only relates to mortgage lenders.


    Look I don't know the first thing about Scottish law, but I would have thought that what happens in a case like this is that the seller does not transfer the property to the buyer. The sale gets cancelled and the seller has a general damages claim for breach of contract, and the limitation period is the one that applies to that?

    The Act you referred to is 8 pages long. Which section did you have in mind.
    No reliance should be placed on the above! Absolutely none, do you hear?
  • I don't know what your missives say but here's some general advice, you may wish to consider this; you have said that Redrow are already 6 months late in completing, have you concluded missives? There may be a stipulation in the missives that they can complete late but in relation to the unfair contract terms act 1977 I would say its a material term of the contract that the house has to be completed at some point, they can't keep you dangling while they decide to complete the house, if it is not ready within a reasonable period of time, that may be a basis to get out.

    I think this is a very good point and should stand in your favour, if it does ever go to Court.

    You need to try to get a fair p/x price for your property, write to Redrow stating the lowest price that you could afford to accept. If they refuse this then it will show that they weren't prepared to negotiate with you.

    Once the property is finally completed, start checking and saving all the websites that they advertise on to ensure that it is readvertised immediately. If not then this will go in your favour also as they have to show a significant effort was made in order to mitigate their loses.

    See the following article http://www.gillhams.com/articles/374.cfm

    If they were to take you to Court and you lost (which I doubt in todays climate) I would imagine that you could fight that you will only pay the difference of value from when you reserved the property to when it should have been completed.
    As you do not have this money the Court will look into your finances and decide how much your can afford to pay them per month. Redrow obviously wouldn't want this as it would take years to recoop and alot of administration/time on their behalf. Another option for them would be to put a freeze on your property so that if you sell within the next 5 years, they will get their money from your equity (if there is any!) or, they may decide to bankrupt you, in which case they get very little/nothing, so it's not really worth their while to actually take you to Court if you have no money or equity.

    Go to your MP/MSP and make them aware of the situation and use them to help with press coverage, but it may be advisable to do this as a last and final option as otherwise Redrow might then want to make an example of you.

    Check your home contents insurance as in some policies you are covered for any legal fees arising from problems when buying/selling a property.

    Good luck and keep smiling, remember - they can't take what you haven't got!!!
  • tbs624
    tbs624 Posts: 10,816 Forumite
    Perhaps you couldcontact Helen Eadie MSP (Dunfermline East) - she tried to introduce a private members bill on missives & final entry dates( see here):although the bill hasn't made it on to tthe statute book it's clearly a topic on which she has strong views.You could also try the Scottish Consumer Council.
  • macphee70
    macphee70 Posts: 55 Forumite
    tbs624 wrote: »
    Perhaps you couldcontact Helen Eadie MSP (Dunfermline East) - she tried to introduce a private members bill on missives & final entry dates :although the bill hasn't made it on to tthe statute book it's clearly a topic on which she has strong views.You could also try the Scottish Consumer Council.

    I was thinking about that too, but I don't think she really got anywhere with it.

    On a slightly happier note looks like Redrow are going to offer us the price we need for our house so we can buy theirs, as long as the banks surveyors value it at what we initally agreeded then it might all work out.

    If not I've been advised that redrow can only sue us for the money they spent upto the date we tried to withdraw from the missives, so in this case the foundations as any judge will pojt out to them that they built the house knowing full well that we couldnt complete and that it was thier own fault. Similar to what elspeth240 has explained.

    Franklee, we have lowered the price of the house by over 10k so we really do feel we have tried everything, Redrow have just been completeley ungiving on this matter.

    Builders Missives are totally biased, there should eb a law to stop then from making such one sided contracts
  • Georgie4
    Georgie4 Posts: 217 Forumite
    macphee70 wrote: »


    Thanks for your advice, we didn't go with a Redrow solicitor as I didn't trust their or our interests and as for the house price you do have a valid point but they are not giving us the market value for our house, they are infact only offering £100,000. This is 20% less than the current market value of our house, now I understand they won't give the market value as they want to sell it on but 20% less.


    Did they offer you part exchange in the first place or is this something you have asked about as you can'tnow sell your house ? If Part ex was offered at the time you decided to buy the house from them then did they not give you a price at that stage ?If so they would have to stick to that price
  • hearts
    hearts Posts: 1,191 Forumite
    edited 13 April 2009 at 12:21PM
    If you aint got it they cant get it. That's the reality. The likelyhood of them pursuing you for this "debt" is very small.
    Quite simply tell them, I cannot afford it and I'm backing out. I have no option.
    They are hoping to frighten you into continuing with the purchase, in case you have the funds, but are simply trying to renage, now the market has moved.
    I hope it goes well for you and please try not to worry so much.
  • jamief
    jamief Posts: 303 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture Combo Breaker
    macphee70 wrote: »
    Builders Missives are totally biased, there should eb a law to stop then from making such one sided contracts

    If people stopped agreeing to them, they would have to change.
  • macphee70
    macphee70 Posts: 55 Forumite
    We got another phone call from redrow in lanark saying they won't go with the part exchange!!! What part exchange? they have yet to offer us one, despite what their solicitior says.

    Can I sue Redrow and thier solicitor for lies?

    They also now want to know when we can complete, we can't, despite telling them about 5 times now. We were just advised to contact our solicitor and try to revoke the missives, what do you think we've been doing for the last 3 months.

    This company are useless, the sales people don't know what the Redrow sales manager is doing and the Redrow managing director does seem to know what anyone else in Redrow is doing. Its amazing they can buid houses when there doesnt seem to be one person in this company that can make a descision.

    Maybe Redrow Scotland are going bancrupt or into liquidation. That would be great.
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