House deeds still have 2 names

Flugelhorn

Have found a helpful local solicitor who has done certified copies of things for me and also happy for me to swear oath there, will ask her when I get that done re the spelling - will take all the relevant paperwork ie my birth certificate

Savvy_Sue

Margot123 wrote: »

Further to my previous post, I have had a call from my solicitor actually advising me not to 'buy hassle'. In these cases, The Land Registry is very non-committal and may accept or not accept a solicitor's statement of facts, depending on who processes the application.

Consequently, I have regrettably withdrawn from the purchase. I'm really upset, and wish the seller had sorted it all out before advertising the property. It's just wasted 4 months of everybody's time and money.

I'm sorry this has happened to you. We had the reverse: the buyers wouldn't proceed until we'd sorted out the names problem. We managed to do it in record time, posting the paperwork around the country in order of who'd be able to deal with it first!

Margot123

Both my solicitor and the seller's solicitor are in agreement that the seller should register the property first.
However, actually persuading them to do so is another thing. I feel sorry for them, in a way, as they can't do anything with the property till they do.
Perhaps they are in denial, they were 2 years applying for Probate and a further 8 months before advertising the property.

Yorkshireman99

Margot123 wrote: »

Both my solicitor and the seller's solicitor are in agreement that the seller should register the property first.
However, actually persuading them to do so is another thing. I feel sorry for them, in a way, as they can't do anything with the property till they do.
Perhaps they are in denial, they were 2 years applying for Probate and a further 8 months before advertising the property.

I agree with their solicitors. Sadly grief does often make people behave in a quite irrational manner but they do at some point have to face the facts..

getmore4less

Tom99 wrote: »

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]You need to download the property title from the Land Reg and check if your parents held the property as joint tenants or tenants in common.

[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]If T in C you will find a statement like this in section B:

[/FONT] ‘[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]RESTRICTION: No disposition by a sole proprietor or the registered estate (except a trust corporation) under which capital money arises is to be
registered unless authorized by an order of the court’.[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]If they own as joint tenants then the property has automatically passed to your mother and it will be a 2 minute online job for your solicitor to put the property into just your mothers name. You can leave this until you have probate and are ready to appoint a solicitor on the sale.

[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]However if the property was held as tenants in common then your father's share would have formed part of his estate and you might need probate – no doubt others will comment on this.[/FONT]

The death certificate for dad is enough along with the grant for mum.

It does need a second person to do the transfer, I think that can be the solicitors.

7CAlanf

Thanks for the advice to date guys. I am pretty sure the house was held as joint tenants, and I will try to confirm this during the coming week .... but like I said I appreciate all of your help, but don't let that stop anyone else contributing if they believe they can assist
Regards

Margot123

Just to add to this.
I have paid out a total of almost £1k to eventually find out the name on the deeds doesn't tally with that on the death certificate.
As a buyer, this annoys me greatly that I have had this expense when the seller was party to the information at the beginning of the process several months ago.
Therefore, don't risk upsetting your potential buyer, and make sure all 'bits of paper' tie up.

Land_Registry

7CAlanf wrote: »

Thanks for the advice to date guys. I am pretty sure the house was held as joint tenants, and I will try to confirm this during the coming week .... but like I said I appreciate all of your help, but don't let that stop anyone else contributing if they believe they can assist
Regards

7CAlanf - focussing in on your OP here solely it will be interesting to read if the property is registered and how.

Generally speaking where you have two registered legal ownersthe legal ownership passes to the surviving one. When you Father sadly passed away that is very much likely to be what has happened here. There's no compulsion to update the register at that point and many don't.

Now that your Mother has also now sadly passed away the property forms part of her estate so probate would be requried for her executor to then deal with it, for example sell. A buyer would rely on the death certificate for Father and probate for Mother to demonstrate that they are both deceased and that the seller is the named executor in the probate.

The TIC aspect can be relevant in some circumstances and the following points apply from a registraiton perspective

• The register is not definitive as to how the joint ownership is held. You can be TICs by virtue of your wills or a declaration of trust (DoT) for example but that does not always mean an entry is made on the register to reflect this
• In some cases a form A restriction may be registered to reflect the wills/DoT/severance for example and it can then restrict the surviving owner should they wish to sell or mortgage for example

If a form A restriction is on the register then it is very likely that you will have to appoint someone to act with you in any sale or show how your Mother became entitled to your late Father's share.
That would not require probate to be issued for him in my experience and if you do need to appoint anyone then it need not be the solicitor but can be anyone.
That point may be better explored IF the registered details confirm a form A restriction exists though

Land_Registry

Flugelhorn and Margot123 - these read as slightly different scenarios re the names as in the former example the discrepancy is with the will(s) whilst in th elatter it is between the death certificate and ownership details

In the former case the wills rarely form part of the conveyancing process re sale/purchase so I can understand why that would not be an so much of an issue

In Margot123's case it would be more of a problem as say for example as Lottie Smith could very well be a different person to a Lotty Smith so the name discrepancy is very important.

My reading of the details posted suggests the property was also unregistered and that adds a further element of doubt/risk to the process hence wanting it registered first.

Our response to any enquiry re pre-submission of an application would invariably involve a caveat over our not deciding until we had received and considered the application as a whole. Whilst I accept that such consideration may well differ between individual caseworkers that is no different in many ways to any buyer, solicitor or other person and how they might consider the situation and risks involved.

All I would add to that is that the solicitors involved, both for seller and buyer, are the the first decision makers as to the level of risk involved. They deal directly with the seller/buyer so are tasked with confirming identities as well as the authenticity of any papers, deeds, documents involved. If they are happy and prepared to confirm that for example the deceased and owner are one and the same person then that may well be sufficient but we also to have to assess the risks involved.