Newbie and naive tenant

dlmcr

In my opinion:

The buyer of the part of the garden has a case against the seller because the garden was not sold with "vacant possession" but was sold subject to an existing tenenacy which disadvantaged the buyer as they could then not legally (exclusively?) use it.

Possibly the buyer of the land also has a case against their solicitors for not checking out properly whether the land was subject to an existing tenancy.

The tenant of the property (you) has a case against the landlard because they are now not able to use part of the garden that is clearly indicated in the tenancy agreement and forms part of the property rented.

In reality it is a complicsted situation so either or both options will cost money and so it would be better to get a dialogue set up between buyer of land, seller of land, and tenant all 3 around the same table, and try to reach a mutually agreeable solution. Judging by what's been posted so far this looks unlikely so unless the tenant is willing to commence action that will probably be quite expensive it will probably be better to bite the bullet and leave at the end of the term.
However perhaps engaging a solicitor to write a letter to the landlord might have some effect as long as you are clear on what you actually want to achieve, this letter would be at relatively little cost and you can see what effect the letter will have.

silvercar

BonandDom wrote: »

I do appreciate that LL's often have a bad deal with tenants, but in this instance surely the LL has some responsibilty to inform us that the garden was sold and ask us to agree to allowing the new owner to take possession?

You don't have to agree!

The way forward is for the landlord to reduce the rent to allow for the smaller garden or for you to retain access to the whole of the garden.

If the latter someone needs to calculate what the cost of renting that piece of garden would be and you landlord pay it over to the new owner.

What the landlord did is sell something that someone else (you) had a legal right to use.

I'm not sure whether tenancy law applies or contract law (I'm not a solicitor) as this is a piece of land rather than a home ie the property itself is not effected. Contract law would say that your tenancy gave you rights over the land that have now been breached, this would allow you some form of compensation/ reduced rent, but it may not require specified amounts of notice that tenancy law would allow.

Bottom line is what do you want?
a) to physically remove the fence and enjoy the whole garden again
b) a sum of money to compensate you
c) reduced rent
d) to be released from your tenancy

(Choose as many as you like.)

I suspect the agent will dress it all up as an admin error, that your contract renewal should have specified a smaller garden.

It would be interesting to see if this has yet been registered with the Land Registry. The property you rent's deeds should have been amended to show the reduced garden and the separate plot shown on the other property. If your landlord has a mortgage, the lender should have agreed to all this.