A substation has been removed and nobody seems to know by who! Ideas?

LTA

Ok I must admit I've never heard of this before so any help would be much appreciated...

My sister is trying to buy a former council house.

On a patch of land in the garden of the property there used to be an electrical substation which was removed 15 years ago (according to current owner).

The electricity company are saying that they did not know that the substation had been removed and have in fact been paying the council rent for the land for the past 15 years.

The council say they have no record of it being removed.

The electricity company say they have no record of it being removed and so can only conclude that as the council have no record either, the previous owners of the house must have removed it!

Does anyone know a way to find out if indeed there did used to be a substation there and if it was removed where a record of it would be kept?

She seems to be at a stalemate with no solution and this is holding up the sale of the house.

kentmum1973

Have a look on google earth to see if there an arial shot of in the back garden. Google earth didn't exist 15 years ago. Also, ask the neighbours.

jjlandlord

A proper electric substation has a significant function (to provide electricity to several properties) and is a dangerous thing to tinker with.

So I do not think that one could so easily remove it and if one could electricity would go out in the area.

Moreover, I doubt that the electricity company could let it run ignored for 15 years without even periodic checks.

Then, if the property is no longer council-owned, why is the electricity company pays rent to the council?

Rather strange, indeed.

LTA

It is a very odd thing to come up isn't it?!

It's holding things up but it feels like something that should be recorded somewhere?!?

tyllwyd

jjlandlord wrote: »

A proper electric substation has a significant function (to provide electricity to several properties) and is a dangerous thing to tinker with. ...

That's what's confusing me - surely someone wouldn't just go out and start dismantling a working electricity substation, and if they did it would stop supplying electricity to wherever it supplied it to and the electricity company would notice!

It seems more likely to me that the electricity company removed it themselves, but didn't keep a proper record of what they've done. I think if they want to claim that someone has illegally removed it, they would need to come up with a bit more proof than their own lack of paperwork.

Was it shown on the deeds when the house was bought from the council?

Why is it holding up the sale - does the electricity company want to reinstate the substation? If they don't, can they just provide some kind of document stating that they no longer have any interest in this piece of land? Thinking about it, if the land has been used by the owner of the garden for 15 years, he/she can probably claim possession of it anyway.


What is your solicitor saying about it?

dorset_nurse

jjlandlord wrote: »

Then, if the property is no longer council-owned, why is the electricity company pays rent to the council?

I doubt the substation land would be part of the houses' deeds if the council were renting it out to the electrical company and they sold the house privately.
Has your sister seen the land registry documents?

LTA

I think the problem is that the substation is coming up on the deeds of the house, even though it doesn’t exist anymore?!

So it looks like there’s a little patch of council owned land in the garden?

The solicitor doesn’t seem to have come across this before which isn’t helping.

jjlandlord

tyllwyd wrote: »

It seems more likely to me that the electricity company removed it themselves, but didn't keep a proper record of what they've done.

Yep, I think that this is the most probable as well.

LTA wrote: »

I think the problem is that the substation is coming up on the deeds of the house, even though it doesn’t exist anymore?!

So it looks like there’s a little patch of council owned land in the garden?

How does it come up in the deed? E.g. it could be that there is just a right of way for engineers to access it.
If it is not on the property's land then surely whether it is actually there or not should be irrelevant with respect to the property's sale.

LTA

As far as I know it looks like it is on the land and is accessed by a ginnel at the back of the property.