Charging Order - stop sale of house?? Can it??

brunettegirl

I have a charging order on my property for 7k it has been there since 2007, I have a payment plan with them which i pay every month.
I need to sell my house and move due to work commitments it is doubtful that my house will sell for enough money to pay both the mortgage and the charging order (there are arrears on the mortgage although below 1k now )
I spoke with the company that have the charging order and they basically said if there isn't enough equity in the house they will refuse to allow sale of the property?????!!!!

Is he bluffing or can they do this?

I have checked my file on land registry and it is listed as an INTERIM CHARGING ORDER.

Anyone with any advice would be greatly appreciated....

In addition to my first question it looks like interest is still been added do i have to apply to the court to get them to stop adding interest?

hippyadam

Is he bluffing? Yes he is!!! They can not block the sale of the house.

Basically the charges get paid in order, so lets say you have equity of £100K. You owe the mortgage co £95K and it has the oldest charge. Plus £7K to the other creditor.

If you sell and get the £100K equity they pay the mortgage first (as it is the oldest charge) then any remaining goes to the next charge, reducing your liability by X amount.

The reason they don't want asale is currently they are a secured creditor, if you move they lose the order and become an unsecured creditor...

Silvafox

I would take some advice from your solicitor on this one. I am pretty sure if you don't at least 'agree' something with them then they can make the sale pretty awkward. As without their permission, the sale can't proceed and although your main lender can 'force' the sale - it will only delay things hugely.

If it was so easy to just sell and then become an unsecured customer - there'd hardly be any point in securing the debt in the first place.

Just my opinion, as I have sold properties with orders on in the past.

I'd get 'proper' advice if I were you...

saltnvinegar

Hiya

OK, you need to not contact this company again, as they will not only tell you a pack of lies, as you have found out, but you do not want them to know any more about when you may be selling your house.

Have a read of this article here which you may find interesting:

http://www.bllaw.co.uk/pdf/financeandrecoveries_0806_charging%20orders%20on%20property.pdf

You need to find a solicitor who is familiar with this process, as many are unaware that you can sell a property, with a charging order, if the mortgage is in joint names, without telling the creditor of the charging order.

Point them in the direction of this article if you need to, but after checking with the land registry they will know this is correct.

Do this correctly and the creditor won't get anything from the sale of the house at all. Nothing more than they deserve after what you have just been told.

Best

Crispy

brunettegirl

Alas the house is not in joint names.

Sparklyfairy

Hmmm, I would also put a post up on the CAG website as they are more aware of the litagation process regarding charging orders..namely Sequenci. Hopefully some more people will pop on here & give advice, but I agree w. SnV, do not call them anymore! Also, from what I understand it is true what hippyadam said - if there's not enough money to pay the charges after the outstanding mortgage is paid from the sale, they're basically stuffed! See why they would lie to you? I would ring around several proper conveyancing solicitors & ask their opinion - you should get a free 1/2 hour session which would be sufficient..hth, SF

brunettegirl

they refused to remove the charging order and the sale has now fallen through - next step repossession of the property!

thechippy

The sale fell through because of the order - why, what happened?

It's also listed as interim and not final?
I might look into this........

brunettegirl

the 2nd company said they would not accept my repayment proposal and remove the charge so the property could be sold.
Solicitor said can't sell a property with a charging order against it.

so had to tell buyer can't sell

mortgage company will now take possession of property as was on a suspended possession order.