Chasing Solicitors frequency - Council owned front garden & porch

Gracie203

Hi all,

I am in the process of buying my first home. It's perfect, it's ex council in a good area (now it is) but the searches for Land Reg brought back that when the vendors purchased the house from the council, the porch and front garden were not included within the boundary! Whatever about the front garden, bit random they didn't include the porch. The house faces onto a circular green so unlikely any houses would be built there in future. I should note the vendor fenced off his front garden about 15 years ago with no issues from the council in that time.

My solicitor is conveniently "chasing enquiries" every time I ask her but to be honest, two weeks on from finding out about this, we are not any closer to a solution. The vendor solicitor seem to also be dragging their heels and it's just causing no end of stress. I'm currently in a house share and will need to find a new place in Jan if this hasn't been sorted (doubt it will by then with Land Reg time scales), but my query being, how often is too often to chase Solicitors on this?

This is literally the last piece in the puzzle, homebuyers survey came back fine (a builder owns the property), all certificates are done, fixtures and fittings have been sorted but seems they are dragging their heels on this.

I work for a large finance company and can't help but think of the repercussions on me if I didn't have an update after two weeks for a client. Maybe it's just me and my work ethic but seems that they are dragging it out.

Has anyone ever had this issue before? I know with Covid everything is delayed but its been two months since my mortgage offer came through, so I am starting to stress about it.

Thanks in advance.

G

FinallyStoppedLurking

What solution are you working towards in terms of the front garden and porch?
Council transfers to vendor?
Vendor buys from council?
Something else?
Depending in what they are doing would vary the timescales.

Presumably the quickest would be to accept as is and deal with yourself but this obviously comes with a risk both to the future value and also mortgageability of the property currently. 

davidmcn

If you're expecting them to buy the additional land from the council, that isn't likely to happen quickly at the best of times - I wouldn't really expect much to have happened within two weeks other than perhaps confirmation that they've contacted the council about it.

Gracie203

davidmcn said:

If you're expecting them to buy the additional land from the council, that isn't likely to happen quickly at the best of times - I wouldn't really expect much to have happened within two weeks other than perhaps confirmation that they've contacted the council about it.

That's what I would also be expecting but I'm constantly getting responses like "I will chase again", It's just getting frustrating as these issues were not found until everything else had been done. I've spent alot of money to back out, and the house is really great for the price. 

Gracie203

FinallyStoppedLurking said:

What solution are you working towards in terms of the front garden and porch?
Council transfers to vendor?
Vendor buys from council?
Something else?
Depending in what they are doing would vary the timescales.

Presumably the quickest would be to accept as is and deal with yourself but this obviously comes with a risk both to the future value and also mortgage ability of the property currently. 

Re solutions, the front garden wouldn't bother me too much, it would be the porch mainly. I would hope given the porch is attached to the house, the council would transfer to the vendor or offer a guarantee of doing so retrospectively once the sale goes through. I'm buying in Newport which has a few council estates now privately owned so I can't imagine this is the first time an issue like this has arisen, but the vendor solicitor basically said she didn't know what to do, and doesn't seem to be taking much initiative to try and resolve it. 
It is a worry that it would affect the mortgage also, and I'm already stretched to do an 85% rather than a 90% LTV. 
I know councils will vary on time scale etc especially given Covid, however, a house sale went through earlier this year 10 doors down so can't imagine that it's a new situation for them to be in. It's just the last hurdle, and is a complete stressor.  

Slithery

Gracie203 said:

It's just getting frustrating as these issues were not found until everything else had been done.

Was it not obvious from the title that you downloaded from the Land Registry for £3 before deciding to view the property?

Gracie203

Slithery said:

Gracie203 said:

It's just getting frustrating as these issues were not found until everything else had been done.

Was it not obvious from the title that you downloaded from the Land Registry for £3 before deciding to view the property?

i didn't do that before viewing it, and I'm not I know anyone who has buying a home. 

babydaisy

Hi Garacie - I'm a conveyancer and just sold a property exactly like this. We resolved it with a bespoke indemnity insurance policy for possessory title of the garden which the seller provided and cost around £200. Backed up with a statutory declaration. This took me half an hour to draft and organise - maybe suggest it to your solicitor.

Gracie203

babydaisy said:

Hi Garacie - I'm a conveyancer and just sold a property exactly like this. We resolved it with a bespoke indemnity insurance policy for possessory title of the garden which the seller provided and cost around £200. Backed up with a statutory declaration. This took me half an hour to draft and organise - maybe suggest it to your solicitor.

Thank you, my solicitor has funnily enough come back with the same response  

NameUnavailable

Slithery said:

Gracie203 said:

It's just getting frustrating as these issues were not found until everything else had been done.

Was it not obvious from the title that you downloaded from the Land Registry for £3 before deciding to view the property?

You would do that for every property you view? Blimey!!

Slithery

NameUnavailable said:

Slithery said:

Gracie203 said:

It's just getting frustrating as these issues were not found until everything else had been done.

Was it not obvious from the title that you downloaded from the Land Registry for £3 before deciding to view the property?

You would do that for every property you view? Blimey!!

Of course. Why wouldn't you?
It prevents you from ending up in situations like the one the OP found themselves in.