Unreadable covenent..

tigsly

We have a covenent on our property - btu the 'version' provided by land registry- is unreadable -it was written in 1855.. is blury - and is incomplete (its 7 pages but starts mid sentence?)

Anyway soliciter said it would probably come down to having an indemntiy policy on it - but who pays for that - us, the vendor, or who?

McBozo

the process tends to be that who ever is selling the property must provide the paper work or provide the indemnity to fix it. usually they, the seller, will buy the indemnity policy in your, the buyers, name.

some folks don't get this because they have a view "well we didn't have to do this before" and the before was like 15 years ago. we thought we would have to offer indemnity and my wife was like, well I'm not paying for that we I didn't have to do this before, but process and stuff changes so I told her yes we have too!

G_M

We get posts here periodically asking about 'Deeds'.

Whilst Title (ownership) nowadays is proved by the Land Registry electronic register in most cases, the paper 'Deeds' still have importance, as this thread shows. If the OP had kept the various Deed documents (assuming the previus owner kept and passed them on!) eg the original covenant, then OP might be able to read the covenant.

jjlandlord

Who's going to enforce an unreadable covenant from 1855?

DRP

jjlandlord wrote: »

Who's going to enforce an unreadable covenant from 1855?

When selling our 1886 property recently the Title referred to a missing covenant which had to be indemnified (both sets solicitors agreed).

In most cases, it seems like indemnity is just a nice little earner for insurance comnpanies ... :eek:

tigsly

The soliciter seems to feel that a 'more readable' version might exist somewhere? And that the indemnity policy will cover us should this be found.. the house is on a road with a church.. so I'm not sure if it covers us for that too..

I'm not quite sure what it indemnifys (is that even a word) us against.. or for how long - does one policy cover us for life??

Brock_and_Roll

Does it say who the covenant is in favourof? Regardless of what the covenant is, it can only be enforced by the successors or assigns of the original beneficiary of the covenant - and they would have to show that they are disadvantaged by the breach. Loads of case law on this.

So typically with a covenant of that age, it might say that you cant run a trade from the house or hang washing outside - this covenant would have been put in place by the developer of the land to protect the value (i.e. keep the working classes out!) and perhaps to preserve the views from the "big house" on which the development land sits. If all these years later the whole area has been developed and/or the inheritors or the original covenant (and there are likely to be dozens after 160 years) live elsewhere then the covenant is just a nice piece of social history.

I have a whole load of victorian covenants on my property from the Lord of the Manor at the time. The current lord now lives 5 miles away and has not knocked on my door in the last 10 years - and in any event his grandfather went bankrupt in the 1950s.

jjlandlord

DRP wrote: »

In most cases, it seems like indemnity is just a nice little earner for insurance comnpanies ... :eek:

Exactly my thought.

They know that the risk insured is close to 0, so that they can come up with very low premiums.
At the same time, most people will not "take the risk" for the sake of a very low premium to pay.
And the money keeps flowing in

tigsly

The first page is missing!! So i have no idea who it is in favour of..

On the title deed it says

A Deed Poll dated 1 September 1855 made between (1) William and (2) John contains restrictive covenant

Brock_and_Roll

Any clues from the main body of the covenant as to what it relates to?

G_M

Many mortgage lenders will insist on indemnity insurance, so buyers often have no choice.

The policy will indemnify the owner against any financial loss resulting from enforcement of the covenant. It will not allow you to do whatever it is the covenant says you cannot do (eg the policy won't help you hang washing outside but might cover the cost of drying at the launderette!)