Unregistered Lease in Charges Register

Denise1961

There is an unregistered lease noted in the charges register of the Title Deeds of my house, I have a buyer and his lender is refusing to release his mortgage unless the lease is removed, they won't accept indemnity insurance. I have a copy of the lease, dated 1964 for a term of 995 years, we bought the house in 1995 and as far as I remember the lease was not mentioned and we bought the property as Freehold- which is what it says on the Title Deeds.  Nobody has ever claimed that this noted lease belongs to them, we have never paid any monies to anyone but when I contacted the Land Registry that said that without proof that we or a previous owner bought the leasehold it can not be removed ever. I feel that some previous owner bought the lease possibly in 1983 when the house was registered as a Freehold.  The people named on the lease are as far as I know, deceased they also have a common surname so it makes it difficult to confirm this and the company named no longer exists. The advice I have received from the Land Registry is to trace the descendants of the previous owners and see if they have the paperwork, but if I can't find proof then it stays! I have submitted a CN1 form and the application was declined, I have taken legal advice and it all comes back to not having a piece of paper that shows what happened with proof that the lease was bought at some point.  Can anyone advise please?

AdrianC

A simple indemnity policy should satisfy the lender.

You're almost certainly right that at some point in time, the leaseholder has bought the freehold - and the lease has just got lost in decades of paperwork and several moves.

I'm surprised your solicitor didn't bring it to your attention when you purchased.

princeofpounds

I think Adrian may have missed the bit where you say that the lender won't accept indemnity insurance. But most will, as he suggests - this is not a totally uncommon situation. Are you aware of any specific features that drive the situation not to accept indemnity?

It may not be news to you, but take a read of this and see if there are any technicalities one which you may be able to determine (end) the lease (for example - are they supposed to pay you ground rent but have failed to do so? You say you have never paid money to anyone but it would be the other way around if someone else was a leaseholder and you own the freehold!).

https://hmlandregistry.blog.gov.uk/2017/02/14/cancellation-of-leases/

Do you have all your paperwork out of archives (if it still exists) from your original purchase?

AdrianC

princeofpounds said:

I think Adrian may have missed the bit where you say that the lender won't accept indemnity insurance. But most will, as he suggests - this is not a totally uncommon situation. Are you aware of any specific features that drive the situation not to accept indemnity?

No, I saw it... hence the "should".

davidmcn

If it is genuinely the peculiar stance of the lender (rather than their solicitor) then the simplest solution might be for the buyer to find a less fussy lender.

princeofpounds

AdrianC said:

princeofpounds said:

I think Adrian may have missed the bit where you say that the lender won't accept indemnity insurance. But most will, as he suggests - this is not a totally uncommon situation. Are you aware of any specific features that drive the situation not to accept indemnity?

No, I saw it... hence the "should".

Ha ok - anyway I guess the question stands - why isn't it satisfying the lender?