House sold without permission...

zzzLazyDaisy

If one joint owner cannot be found, eventually the courts will step in. After all, if one person is living in a jointly owned house and unable to move on with their life because the other joint owner has vanished off the face of the earth, there has to be a back stop. But going to court over a matter like this is expensive and not one to be taken lightly - she would have had to prove to the court that she had taken all reasonable steps to contact him, so it would seem likely that your dad did a good job of cutting all contact.

haras_nosirrah

I can see this from the ex wife point of view

If your mums partner cut off all contact then what was she supposed to do. How could she get permission to sell if he disappeared off the face of the earth?

What was his plan - to contact her in the future?

GDB2222

If dad gets hold of the court order, it may tell him what's happened to any equity. As he wasn't represented at the hearings, it's quite likely to have gone to his wife. It's high time he divorces, anyway, unless there are religious objections to that.

G_M

GDB2222 wrote: »

...It's high time he divorces, anyway, even if there are religious objections to that.

:cool:

G_M

Land_Registry_representative wrote: »

....
In the circumstances I would recommend that you do check the actual registered title for the property as suggested. The minimum fee for doing so is £4 by using our online service.

.....

Has the fee gone up again?

neverdespairgirl

James_N wrote: »

This is how it might happen:

1. The property was not registered (from memory if bought before around 1988, depending on area).
.

Depending a lot on the area. I think the first national schemes started in about 1925! But there are also local schemes from before then.

John_Pierpoint

More information about The Land Registry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HM_Land_Registry

Land_Registry

G_M wrote: »

Has the fee gone up again?

No G_M - the quoted post is from July last year when it was £4. The fee is now £3.

James_N wrote: »

The property was not registered (from memory if bought before around 1988, depending on area). QUOTE]

Take a look at our Practice Guide 51 which provides a list of administrative areas and the 'trigger dates' for compulsory registration.

Areas were added over time and whilst many would have been subject to compulsory registration before 1988 some were not. If you locate the administrative area for your property in the guide you can check the trigger date (compulsory registration).

1925 was a key date from a legislation perspective with the Land Registration Act 1925 (replaced by the LRA 2002). However land registration has taken place since as far back as 1862 although the format of titles as we know them today started in 1899 with City of Westminster, London.
The 1st December 1990 was the date when the whole of England & Wales became compulsorily registerable..

John_Pierpoint

If it was not registered prior to this latest sale, it is now.
I would hope and expect that the Land Registry would do an extra thorough job on first registration.
[Though I have my doubts having bought an unregistered property in the 1970s only to have the next door "field" (area of waste land) and a chunk of my garden subsequently registered (following compulsory registration) to some one else. The transaction was based on a conveyance to a long lost prior owner in 1912, who almost certainly sold it in 1923 to the same property company, as sold the plot in 1928 on which my home was built in 1932..................... .
My wife and I had to swear the documentation of our 1970s purchase (fortunately we had lived in it for 12 years) and that got it unregistered; or more accurately replaced by a registered legal caution in our names; this in effect says we think we own our home & garden, so beware of trying to deal with anyone else.
Some other chancer aided by a dubious solicitor, has since tried and failed to register another chunk of our garden.]

So what I am saying is that if the Land Registry has messed up, it can be sued.
When the "open register" first started there were a number of thefts of land perpetrated against usually unsuspecting occupiers who had managed to pay off their mortgage. The new "buyer" promptly mortgaged "their" property and did a runner with the mortgage money. The first thing the occupiers knew about it was when the surveyor on behalf of the bank turned up to check out the non payment repossession situation.
A particularly fine example of such fraud was featured on "Heir Hunters" (BBC morning TV) in Romford if I remember correctly, where the accounts of the intestate former owner had been emptied, using a fake will, but fortunately the solicitor arranging the purchase of the empty property thought they smelled a rat.

Orlando_Virgin

This isn't going to help but what does he expect when he's cut all contact leaving himself, half of HIS mortgage and house entirely in his ex's hands without even bothering to check what was going on?

He's only bothered now because it's been sold and he might be entitled to a pay out.