Where to store deeds ??

cheggers

My mum's about to pay off her mortgage in the next few months.

I mentioned to her about leaving £100 on the mortgage so the building society keeps the deeds. Sadly they don't offer the service anymore.

So she's looking at HSBC deed storage, think its about £40 a year or her solitors (but she does not trust them as they have a habbit of loosing her stuff)

Any tips of where she store them???

djohn2002uk

I could be wrong, but, I don't think that deeds are the valuable asset in need of ultra safe storage that they used to be. A check with the land registry about this would be a good idea because I think they hold records now as to your title to the property etc. So in my mind, my deeds are nothing more than a historical record of this house and as such, of some value to me but all details needed in the event of me selling the property I could get from the land registry.
But check with them, from other threads I've read on here they are very helpful.

tryhard_2

yes i agree with above post re deeds

pboae

I've got the deeds to my house. The mortgage company said they don't need them anymore as it is all done electronically. There is loads of interesting details in there though, as it is an old house, so we bought one of those fire safe things that look like a hard briefcase, and they are in that in a cupboard.

TheToothfairy_3

My husband has a bank account with Natwest and they hold documents at their premises. We placed the deeds to our house with them using their 'envelope' service rather than a deposit box and it costs us about five pounds a year. You do need to have an account with them though.
HTH.

Thefunkygibbons

I just have them in a box in the loft, I know which one

It is all electronic these days

Ian_W

I certainly wouldn't pay £40 a year for storeage IF the property title is electronically stored at the land registry. You can check this online for £2 and if it is then the docs are just of historical value really.
We keep ours at home in a "fireproof" box with a copy at a close relatives.
Our household insurance [and I'm sure many others] will pay up to £250 if the originals are lost/damaged and "need replacing" - I'm sure with electronic registration the insurers are on a winner because you can buy, sell and remortage without them.

yeoyeo

I have previously worked in conveyancing and I can say that many firms hold deeds for free in fire proof storage.

Many of you are correct, if your property has been registered at the Land Registry then deeds aren't absolutely necessary to sell your property in the future, however they can come in handy if questions are raised by your buyer's solicitors.

LizEstelle

yeoyeo wrote:

I have previously worked in conveyancing and I can say that many firms hold deeds for free in fire proof storage.

Many of you are correct, if your property has been registered at the Land Registry then deeds aren't absolutely necessary to sell your property in the future, however they can come in handy if questions are raised by your buyer's solicitors.

Watch out if you lose track of where the deeds are. Solicitors firms holding your deeds can merge with others or go out of business.

I have a few buy-to-let properties and panicked the other day when I realised that I couldn't track down the deeds for one of them. In all cases but one, the original conveyancing solicitors were still holding the deeds, which was fine.

Eventually, it turned out that I myself had been sent the deeds for the 'missing one' as part of the final bundle of paperwork and they were lying in a dusty old boxfile in my attic!

I've been told that 'missing deeds' can be a problem if you want to sell as the buyer would probably insist on obtaining an indemnity insurance against possible false title, usually at YOUR expense.

lisyloo

I have mine at home on a shelf.
Missing deeds can be a problem but as long as you are sensible about putting them somewhere safe and knowing where they are then this should be OK.
House insurance does cover reconstructing them and in the worst case the indemnity insurance is probably cheaper than the £40 per year that is being suggested, although you should do your best to keep them safe to avoid potential hassle as these worst case scenarios could slow down the process and/or put off buyers which is not what you want.

moongarden

We have just received a final bundle of papers regarding our house purchase from the solicitor. The covering letter states that they hold no paper copies but will keep their digital scanned records for 6 years.

The bundle contains a couple of indemnity policies and two land certificates (freehold and leasehold for different parts of the property) but nothing in there marked as deeds. I had thought there should be an original old document with olde english writing on which says deeds at the top?