Agricultural Occupancy Clause

grumpy2

Hello and thanks in advance for your help, from a Newbie. Please can anyone tell me if an Agricultural Occupancy Clause has, by law, to be included in a Deed of Sale? I ask this in advance of a meeting with CAB next week. We are selling a property that we bought nearly 10 years ago and have just discovered in the National Parks Planning Permissions that the dwelling (our home) has an AOC that we were unaware of. I need to establish liability for this error. I understand it is more a legal issue but since AOC properties tend to attract 30% less than market value, and we paid market value because we were unaware of the tie, it has serious financial implications for us as well. Any help or pointers gratefully received. We are aware of the 10 year breach rule which will enable us to apply for a CLEUD. Thank you.

xylophone

just discovered in the National Parks Planning Permissions that the dwelling (our home) has an AOC that we were unaware of

Have you contacted the solicitor who acted for you in the purchase?

grumpy2

We are getting our file back from them tomorrow and will investigate that quietly.

tim123456789

what do you mean by "deed of sale"?

If a propery has a planning restriction on it then surely that information ought to be in the council search.

grumpy2

thank you - yes it should have - we hope to have more info when we pick up our file from the original solicitor today. I will be out of the country for a few days and I do appreciate your responses but I may not be able to reply.

tim123456789

So,

are we agreed that it should be in the council search?

If so I see 3 options:

1) you didn't get a council search - your fault.
2) You got one, the info's in there and the sol didn't point it out to you - the sol's fault.
3) you got one and the info isn't there- the council's fault

I can see no scenario where this is the fault of the vendor or his representative (aka the agent).

BICBW

tim


tim

grumpy2

yes we are agreed it should have showed up on search - we have both Council and National Parks here (it's the NP permission that has the clause) but at the moment it looks like the searches stopped with the Council. I am hoping that the solicitor acting on our behalf would have had to put his findings in writing if he were aware of such a clause (and we never received anything from him to say so) so we should know more later. If he did not carry out thorough enough searches, we will sue him. I think there is probably little else to ask about now until we are further informed.