Searches on a piece of land

ellectrastar

If you’re buying an agricultural field for grazing, do you really still need searches the same as when you’re buying a house? The solicitor says they can break them down and get individual ones done but as usual they don’t advise, just say it’s my decision. 
Dont think local authority and chancel searches are relevant, but maybe water and environmental? Has anyone bought land that can tell me what they did??

davidmcn

Some of them will be relevant, others less so. It depends what you're concerned about, but there's very little which is going to prevent you from using it from grazing, so I probably wouldn't bother.
And "as usual they don’t advise" is pretty poor really - you are paying them for their advice, not just to act as a postbox.

Davesnave

If you want to do some research yourself, the National Library of Scotland holds old maps (including England) that may show previous uses, especially old footpaths. Where I live, some old footpaths have been researched and re-opened recently, which is fine if you're a walker, but maybe not so good if the new route goes through your grazing!

The archive is good for folks to know about anyway:

https://maps.nls.uk/

ellectrastar

Yeah, they just said it’s my decision at the end of the day. I never find them very helpful in that regard; too scared of it going wrong and you blaming them I guess. 

I’m in Wales so not sure anything would be on old maps. We’ve had it confirmed that there are no rights of way for third parties over it. I have a footpath through a field where I live, but at least I can mostly keep an eye on this. Wouldn’t want one in this field as it’s away and unfortunately not all walkers are responsible. 

Davesnave

ellectrastar said:

. I’m in Wales so not sure anything would be on old maps. 

The Ordnance Survey reached Wales....

trex227

My parents didn’t bother with searches when they bought some additional land recently. They’d been renting it for years and so know the area well. I guess it depends what you plan to do with it, but if it’s just grazing I’m not sure there’s anything that could come up on searches that would have much of an effect on value?? Although if you’re in an area that has issues with environmental contamination that could potentially be worthwhile