Revaluation in light of new info?

pickles13

We are currently in the process of buying a house. It has just come to light that a small parcel of land in the rear garden is actually unregistered land. The seller's solicitors have refused to apply for adverse possession as it would delay exchange, so we have agreed to do it after exchange (using their declaration) providing that before exchange they pay our extra solicitors fees in relation to this (around £700); this has yet to be agreed. My solicitor has said that the lender may wish to do another valuation on the property in light of this new info. If so, would I have to pay for this? Are they likely to reduce the offer? (I appreciate that no one can answer exactly but was wondering if anyone had any knowledge or experience in this).

Stressing!!!

Doozergirl

When we bought our house, I didn't notice until afterwards that the boundaries weren't correct on the plan.

I don't know if the Land Registry rep has something to comment, but although we had conversations with our solicitor after the event, I am positive that we dealt with the adverse possession ourselves at very low cost. Certainly not £700 or I'd have cried!

They sent a man out, he looked at the land and said that the land had clearly been within our defined boundaries for some time and we have possessory title now.

Our lender wasn't going to revalue as it had already all gone through and we now own it on paper, as such, but unless the amenity is really impacted by the lack of that piece of land, I'm sure it will be fine.

We have bought and sold another house that had possessory title on part of the front garden without anyone battig an eyelid, so don't worry too much about resale.

Davesnave

If I recall correctly it's the last 4m at the end of your garden, which wouldn't make any impact on value if it's a reasonable sized plot.

I retained about 1/3 of of the the 0.25 acre garden at my old house. That had no impact on the value of the house, as there was still more garden left than around many comparable houses in the area.

eddddy

A couple of thoughts...

Firstly, it probably wouldn't affect the value of the property - but mortgage lenders often only employ admin people, who wouldn't want to make that judgement. So they might insist on having a re-valuation by a professional valuer.

And what if you buy, and somebody challenges your adverse possession claim?

Even if you're 'in the right', you might run up big legal costs proving it in court - it could even be that the legal costs come to more than the land is worth. (I've heard of at least one case, where the 'squatter' dropped their claim, because it was cheaper to just buy the land from the 'challenger' rather than run up legal costs.)

If that land is important to you, you could ask your seller about indemnifying your legal costs - but that starts to get very messy.

Doozergirl

Google earth is your friend with adverse possession.

I remember, I did pay for an indemnity policy through solicitor. Can't remember how much.

pickles13

Thanks all. Yes it is a large plot anyway so hopefully it won't make too much difference.

Doozergirl, did you do it all yourself? The cost of £700 is 2.5 hours of solicitors fees plus VAT, and the land registry fee (about £50 apparently). Our solicitor is also requesting an indemnity policy too. Who knows what the seller will agree. She is desperate to move into her new house though so does not want anything delaying things. We, OTOH, are in rented so not too fussed...

Doozergirl

I'm pretty certain that I filled out a Land Registry form. If my solicitor had told
me he had to do it, I would have believed him. It all seemed very simple though.