Does this seem dodgy? House Sale

Okydoky25

Try to keep this brief. A family member went into a care home a couple of years back. His home had an equity share belonging to a company who released a lump sum to him about 15 years ago. When he went into the home they basically took over and I found out that the house was up for auction at the beginning of this year.

I called to find out what was going on as we had not been informed of the sale and I was advised by that company that they had already sold the house in Nov 15 for £250k. His share was with their legal team. They said who ever was now selling at auction was who purchased it from them in Nov.

Now this made sense however there is no records showing the property sold in Nov 15 and when the sale went through in Feb for £340k at auction his details were still on the deeds? How is that possible? I'm starting to think that they are saying it was sold and his share of sale is £125k when in fact it should be £180K.

Where would I even start with getting this looked into for him?

G_M

1) who are you? do you have POA or some other right to be involved?

2) what does the Land registry Title show as
* current owner?
* date of purchase?
* price paid?

3) What information do you have about the Equity release arrangement?
* Rights of the company to sell, and in what circumstances?
* distribution of sale monies?

Do you have original paperwork?

4) What efforts did the company make at the time of the sale to obtain the best price?

Okydoky25

G_M wrote: »

1) who are you? do you have POA or some other right to be involved?

That's were it gets complicated. No one has POA

2) what does the Land registry Title show as
* current owner? Its now been transfer to a property developer as far as I can google the new owners name it goes to a building company.
* date of purchase? Feb 2016
* price paid? £340k

3) What information do you have about the Equity release arrangement? None. All paper work had been removed from the house. I got the equity realse details from his deeds on line.
* Rights of the company to sell, and in what circumstances? No idea.
* distribution of sale monies? NO idea if the truth but they told us 50% is his.

Do you have original paperwork? No.

4) What efforts did the company make at the time of the sale to obtain the best price?

No idea. They say it was advertised through a local estate agent for the original sale but we cant find any record of that only for when it was up for auction.

G_M

Originally Posted by G_M
1) who are you? do you have POA or some other right to be involved?

That's were it gets complicated. No one has POA

Then either
* the owner, your family member, must follow this up, or
* the owner, your family member, must grant someone POA to act on his behalf, or
* if the family member lacks capacity, you must apply to the Court of Protection either for authority to make a one-off decision, or to become a permenant Deputy for your family member

2) what does the Land registry Title show as
* current owner? Its now been transfer to a property developer as far as I can google the new owners name it goes to a building company.
* date of purchase? Feb 2016
* price paid? £340k

So in Nov 2015 it was sold to X, for £250, and in Feb 16, it was sold again (at auction) to a Developer for £340?

3) What information do you have about the Equity release arrangement? None. All paper work had been removed from the house. I got the equity realse details from his deeds on line.
* Rights of the company to sell, and in what circumstances? No idea.
* distribution of sale monies? NO idea if the truth but they told us 50% is his.

Do you have original paperwork? No.

4) What efforts did the company make at the time of the sale to obtain the best price?

No idea. They say it was advertised through a local estate agent for the original sale but we cant find any record of that only for when it was up for auction.

How come you've waited till now if you found out about the auction last Feb?

Who, if anyone, has been looking after him since he went into the care home? Was anyone checking on the house? Ensuring the insurance, utilities & council tax were paid?
Did he find/arrange the care home himself, or was someone helping him? Who?

Seems strange that his family seem to have ignored him/his property completely.

But without authority, there's nothing you can do. So that is the first step.

Okydoky25

There is absolutely no record of a sale back in Nov 15 for £250k which is when then Equity company advised they sold his house. The sale that is registered is in (Sorry not Feb) March 2016 and shows his name on the transfer deeds. This leads me to think there was no such sale back in Nov 15 at all?

Reason for delay checking this was it was not available until recently to check on line.

He is in a care home with Dementia. Up to this point I was the only relative to still keep comtact. It gets complicated as without going into detail a Next of Kin turned up after 40 years of no contact and as far as everyone (Social Services) is now concerned shes main contact altho doesn't have POA she has said she would contest if I applied.

I have no idea how they went about selling his house in the 1st place if that was even legal. My question is. Is it at all possible that the company did sell it in Nov 15 as they say and his name still be on the transfer deeds for the next sale in the March 16?

G_M

his name still be on the transfer deeds for the next sale in the March 16

" So far as I know the Land Registry do not show the name of the seller, only the date and price of a Transfer and the ew owner's name.

What exactly are you looking at?

Is it at all possible that the company did sell it in Nov 15

Not all prices are publicly shown, though dates are.

I also think the Title at the LR would only show the last Transfer - not previous ones, so again - what exactly are you looking at?

konark

Whatever the technicalities, a house does not rise in value by 40% in 4 months (unless in London), particularly when the higher price was achieved at an auction. It would seem the finance company have not sold it for its true value, probably sold it to themselves, or a sister company/director etc. Many companies operating in the equity release market are disreputable and the whole industry seems to be an unregulated minefield of sharp practice, inflated charges and high interest rates.

From what I read it seems the finance people had bought 50% equity of the house and repayment/sale could be triggered by them going into care. I wonder how this was expedited if he had dementia, he would not have been capable of signing the releases or even contacting the company to inform them. Was a family member involved in this?

You could try asking round local estate agents if they sold the house or the auction house to enquire who sold the property. If you can link the auction seller to the finance company then it's an in-house job.

Sadly if he's in a home it might be academic anyway as if he's in for any substantial period the nursing home will take all his capital whether it's £125,000 or £180,000.

CIS

The land registry will do 'historic' records where you can obtain a copy of the record as it was at a specific time. Details are here - https://www.gov.uk/get-information-about-property-and-land/search-the-register

You would need to pick a specific date to use but as long as this is became Nv 15 and Mar 16 then it should say who was registered as the owner as at that date,

Craig

AdrianC

AFF8879 wrote: »

Are you able to share the name of the company at all? Is it a reputable high street bank / financial services provider?

It's an equity-release provider. I think we all know the answer to "are they reputable?"...

But that's all kinda academic. The question is simply one of whether they've followed the contract that the relative willingly signed a decade and a half earlier. Nobody knows, because his copy of that contract's gone AWOL - and the OP has no legal basis to do any enquiring anyway.

Okydoky25

konark wrote: »

Whatever the technicalities, a house does not rise in value by 40% in 4 months (unless in London), particularly when the higher price was achieved at an auction. It would seem the finance company have not sold it for its true value, probably sold it to themselves, or a sister company/director etc. Many companies operating in the equity release market are disreputable and the whole industry seems to be an unregulated minefield of sharp practice, inflated charges and high interest rates.

From what I read it seems the finance people had bought 50% equity of the house and repayment/sale could be triggered by them going into care. I wonder how this was expedited if he had dementia, he would not have been capable of signing the releases or even contacting the company to inform them. Was a family member involved in this?

You could try asking round local estate agents if they sold the house or the auction house to enquire who sold the property. If you can link the auction seller to the finance company then it's an in-house job.

Sadly if he's in a home it might be academic anyway as if he's in for any substantial period the nursing home will take all his capital whether it's £125,000 or £180,000.

Thank you. I think that's all I can do. I understand in the scheme of things its not a lot but anything extra that would make his life comfortable is worth looking into plus I don't think its right that this company seem to have taken advantage of his situation.

I am also struggling to see how I get this released to SS to go towards his care as I believe the Next of Kin would prefer it held where it is so it doesn't get spent on him at all!

BJV

Okydoky25 wrote: »

Thank you. I think that's all I can do. I understand in the scheme of things its not a lot but anything extra that would make his life comfortable is worth looking into plus I don't think its right that this company seem to have taken advantage of his situation.

I am also struggling to see how I get this released to SS to go towards his care as I believe the Next of Kin would prefer it held where it is so it doesn't get spent on him at all!

That's so sad. Why does money make people do such horrible things? It is now that he needs to be looked after not when he is gone.

Forgive me if I am wrong but I think what you are trying to say is that the company are trying to say the house was sold for a lesser amount so that they have to give less back to the owner. E.g sold house in 2015 for £200 they only give back £200 less equity release of £100 = £100 back to owner.

This would mean if the house was sold after the original sale they would not be responsible for the difference.

House sold for £340 ( so first sale never really happened ) they have to give back £240

Naughty, I can not understand why they would ever risk it? After all it is fraud. As other posts said which company is it.