Land Registry questions

PurpleGown

Afternoon. We are awaiting the Ministry to release some form for ground rent at my partners old house that we are selling. This has been since January and we are waiting for this to clear so we can use the money for deposit on offer.

How long do we have to wait? Our conveyancer his end isnt very quick in response and seller our end is getting anxious.

flyer

Land_Registry wrote: »

You can but the land registration fee is payable whether you use a solicitor or not. The solicitor's fee woukd be more than £100
Our online guidance deals with the registration aspects

Thanks for the reply, but the link seems to be for the vendor rather than the purchaser?

Land_Registry

PurpleGown wrote: »

Afternoon. We are awaiting the Ministry to release some form for ground rent at my partners old house that we are selling. This has been since January and we are waiting for this to clear so we can use the money for deposit on offer.

How long do we have to wait? Our conveyancer his end isnt very quick in response and seller our end is getting anxious.

'Ministry'? - I'm guessing you mean an application has been submitted to us. If so then we do have a backlog of this type of work so IF there is an urgency, such as the delay is causing you a financial hardship, then your conveyancer should get in touch with those details/evidence and ask us to expedite their application

Land_Registry

flyer wrote: »

Thanks for the reply, but the link seems to be for the vendor rather than the purchaser?

The link and online guidance refers to how to transfer the ownership so it still relevant to what is required and the fee payable. It is worded that way as most people needing the guidance are transferring to a new partner or to a family member rather than doing their own sale for example

Delphinium_Blue

Hello, I recently found out that my father, who died in December 2017, has his name on the Official Registry of Title for a property I had no knowledge that he owned. All I knew was, after my step mother died in 1995, the house was left to my stepbrother and my father was allowed to continue living in the property for as long as he needed to. The stepbrother put the house up for sale after my father's death. Last month, I checked the Land Registry to see if the ownership had changed to find out if the house had been sold. I was surprised to find that the proprietors are listed as my father and his stepson on the deeds. I then contacted the Estate Agent who said the property had been sold, so I do not understand why their names were still on the Deeds at the Land Registry. Could this be because the new owner, assuming there is one, has not had the Deeds updated yet? I applied for an Official Copy of the register of title and it still lists my father and stepson as owners on 20 March 2019! Also, I note my father's name was added to the Title in 2004. My father did not tell me about this, I knew nothing until last month. My father was living in, and looking after, the property while his stepson lived in a house elsewhere, and always insisted the house was not his. Please can you tell me why someone, in my father's situation, would have their name added to the property Deeds?

da_rule

Delphinium_Blue wrote: »

Hello, I recently found out that my father, who died in December 2017, has his name on the Official Registry of Title for a property I had no knowledge that he owned. All I knew was, after my step mother died in 1995, the house was left to my stepbrother and my father was allowed to continue living in the property for as long as he needed to. The stepbrother put the house up for sale after my father's death. Last month, I checked the Land Registry to see if the ownership had changed to find out if the house had been sold. I was surprised to find that the proprietors are listed as my father and his stepson on the deeds. I then contacted the Estate Agent who said the property had been sold, so I do not understand why their names were still on the Deeds at the Land Registry. Could this be because the new owner, assuming there is one, has not had the Deeds updated yet? I applied for an Official Copy of the register of title and it still lists my father and stepson as owners on 20 March 2019! Also, I note my father's name was added to the Title in 2004. My father did not tell me about this, I knew nothing until last month. My father was living in, and looking after, the property while his stepson lived in a house elsewhere, and always insisted the house was not his. Please can you tell me why someone, in my father's situation, would have their name added to the property Deeds?

Without seeing the deed that added your father to the title it’s pretty much an impossible question to answer.

The long and the short of it appears to be that, in 2004, your father was given a share of the property. By this time it seems that the property was in the ownership of your step-brother, so he’s probably the best person to speak to.

When the estate agent says the property has sold, they may mean that, as far as they’re concerned, it’s sold. This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s completed legally.

Does the title contain a restriction along the lines of “No disposition by a sole proprietor...”. If so, your fathers share will pass in accordance with his will. If not, his share will pass automatically to your step brother (people often don’t update the register in this case until they come to sell/mortgage etc).

There is also a practical consideration in that, by the sounds of it, this share in the property was not accounted for when inheritance tax was calculated. Obviously depending on your dads estate, this may or may not have made a difference to the tax payable.

It seems that your first port of call though should be your step-brother.

Abbicarbs

Hello,

I am wondering if you could help me please.

I am currently in the process of buying a house. It was built 60 years ago. It is a bungalow with a dorma and the people who lived in it before us lived in it since it was built. They have both passed away and their daughters are selling their house.

My solicitor has advised that there is a query with the land and there some registered and some unregistered elements. When I asked my solicitor how long it would take they said “it’s difficult to say as I am guessing the land registry may have to order files as the deceased I think owned the property for many years so information may not be held electronically” has anyone else experienced this and can give me a rough idea on how long these things take. Ive been trying to move since August with my disabled son being unable to live in this house any longer but people keep pulling out meaning I lose the house I am buying and then the saga starts all over again and I’m scared this is going to happen again.

Sorry it’s a long post

Thanks
ACB

G_M

Hello,

I am wondering if you could help me please.

I am currently in the process of buying a house. It was built 60 years ago. It is a bungalow with a dorma and the people who lived in it before us lived in it since it was built. They have both passed away and their daughters are selling their house.

If the same person has owned the property for 60 years, it is unlikely to be registered. Unregistered land is not uncommon. Indeed until the later part of the last century all property was unregistered.

There is a well established process (hundreds of years!) for confirming land ownership, and transferring ownership, for unregistered land - it's just that it is different from the process for registered land.
If it is unregistered (or part of it is unregistered) then

the land registry may have to order files as the deceased I think owned the property for many years so information may not be held electronically”

makes no sense. The LR will not hold any electronic files, nor will they "order" them. (by definition, 'unregistered' means the Land Registry has no registration!)

Your solicitor should follow the good old-fashioned process for checking paper records for unregistered land.


Of course, if you are using a cheap, online coneyancing warehouse, they may not have experience of this - and certainly the statement above suggests they do not know what they are doing........!

Delphinium_Blue

Many thanks for your reply. Unfortunately, we will have difficulty with asking any questions of my stepbrother. There is some dispute with the property that we do not wish to 'stir up' by making contact with him. When my father died, my stepbrother claim the existence of a 'Deed of Trust' he signed with my father. He claims this means my father was duty bound to maintain the property while he lived there. The day before my father's funeral, the stepbrother took me (and the executor) round the house and pointed out things that, in his view, had not been maintained (heating system, wiring, interior decoration) and claimed that my father was owing them several thousands of pounds from his estate to pay for this maintenance under the Deed of Trust. The executor asked to see this document but the stepbrother refused accusing us of 'prying' into my father's affairs. He was threatening to block the probate on my father's estate (enter a caveat) if we did not pay. This was in 2017 but we have not paid and stepbrother has not contacted us since. Our father was suffering from Alzheimer's disease for at least 2 years prior to his death, therefor we believe their demands are unreasonable. Our solicitor has tried, and failed, to locate the Deed of Trust and may have to demand the stepbrother produces it. We do not believe he will give us an honest answer to any questions about the Deeds and we don't want any more demands for money from him. This situation has caused my family considerable distress.:(

Abbicarbs

Thanks for this. My solicitor is an expensive conveying solicitor who have many sites in the north I thought that this wouldn’t be a problem for them. They are saying elements of the property are freehold and some are leasehold so I presume the paper documents will need to be ordered on the bit that’s leasehold? Any questions I can ask them to make sense of this?

Thanks for your help