Chancel Repair Liability

Sp3no

This has been thrown up by our sol when he has been conducting his searches. Basically the Sol now pay £12 for a search to see if the property you are buying has a Chancel Repair Liability. The search came back that there is a possability? The house we are buying is a 1968 house. There is a church nearby but surely this will not apply to any of the houses around here. The Sol requested that the seller pay the £47 as an insurance for us against any claims to us under the Chancel Repair Liability? I thought this was strange as the only time i had heard of this was in the case recently regarding the couple that had to sell their property to fund the 250K repairs to their church. Is this just a company selling insurance jumping on the band wagon, or is this a serious part of buying property now.
I was shocked he is asking the seller to pay, personally im prepared to take the risk. I just do not understand why they cannot say that you are or are not liable, why do we get a response that is basically a maybe? What was the £12 for?

gmgmgm

I suggest you try searching the forum for the many threads on this topic.

Richard_Webster

There are lots of threads on this so I suggest you search through them.

Your solicitors could have done a full search (about £100) to show whether the property actually has a liability to repair the Church, which by the way isn't necessarily the nearest Church but the Church of the parish the property was in (I think) 1836 long before most urban parishes were formed. If that search showed the property not actually affected then fine, no problem.

However if the full search shows actual liability then you and your solicitors have an obligation to register that fact at the Land Registry which instantly increases the cost of Chancel Liability insurance. For that reason you do not want to know that there is actual liability the insurance for possible liability is a lot cheaper - the sort of figures you quoted.

Mortgage lenders require solicitors to check this sort of thing and I don't think it is optional if you are getting a mortgage - even if you don't think the risk is worth bothering about your solicitor will still have to get the insurance to protect the lender. Your solicitor should ask the seller's solicitors if their client will pay the £50-£60 for the insurance, but they often won't. You then get to the point of whether you spend a week or two arguing about who is going to pay the money, with everything on hold while the argument goes on, or you agree to pay and get yourself moved.

maninthestreet

Sp3no wrote: »

This has been thrown up by our sol when he has been conducting his searches. Basically the Sol now pay £12 for a search to see if the property you are buying has a Chancel Repair Liability. The search came back that there is a possability? The house we are buying is a 1968 house. There is a church nearby but surely this will not apply to any of the houses around here. The Sol requested that the seller pay the £47 as an insurance for us against any claims to us under the Chancel Repair Liability? I thought this was strange as the only time i had heard of this was in the case recently regarding the couple that had to sell their property to fund the 250K repairs to their church. Is this just a company selling insurance jumping on the band wagon, or is this a serious part of buying property now.
I was shocked he is asking the seller to pay, personally im prepared to take the risk. I just do not understand why they cannot say that you are or are not liable, why do we get a response that is basically a maybe? What was the £12 for?

If the seller refuses to pay, I would strongly suggest you pay for the insurance yourself - £47 is little to pay, compared to all the other housebuying costs).