We didn't know our new house had tenants.

lika_86

housebuyer143 said:

fatbelly said:

What a nightmare. I don't think your conveyancer can wash his hands quite so quickly of this. Certainly not if the tenants can evidence they have an Assured Shorthold Tenancy and you now have legal fees to gain possession of a property you just bought.

I will be interested in views from a legal perspective

As part of the sale, the other side would have had to confirm if vacant possession was being given. If they said no, then your solicitor should have spotted this, if they said yes then the seller has literally lied to you and done a runner! 
Do you know which is it? 

Absolutely this!

Gentoo365

I would be taking legal advice, and not from the solicitors involved in the purchase.  

Grumpy_chap

[Deleted User] said:

We viewed a house several times before buying-although obviously lived in ,we never saw the people who lived there.Exchanged contracts,received keys and arrived at house moving in day to find it still full of furniture.Long story short,unknown to us,the house was tenanted and the tenants refuse to move.We had to put our furniture in storage and spend a week in a hotel with our children,currently living in an AirBnB eight weeks later.Our solicitor refuses to have anything to do with it,he says his checks didn't turn up any tenants so nothing to do with him.The eviction process can take up to 40 weeks and tenant has just found herself pregnant again so no doubt that will extend things even more.The house is being trashed in front of our eyes,no rent is being paid,the previous owners have gone back to Australia and don't/won't respod to any communication-it seems to be a false address anyway as we can't find any trace of it online.So we're stuck paying for our  current accommodation and storage,huge legal fees and no light at the end of the tunnel.

Was the property sold on the basis of vacant possession?
If so, your Solicitor should take up the matter of breach of contract with the Vendor's Solicitor.
If the property was not sold on the basis of vacant possession, your Solicitor should have noted this and drawn the matter to your attention.

silvercar

Even if the sellers are in Australia, I would think there is every chance their solicitors are in the UK. Maybe their solicitors weren’t aware of the tenants? Your solicitor should be acting for you, I would put in a complaint if they failed to deal with the situation.

silvercar

theartfullodger said:

Congratulations on your new ownership of property.  You are now landlords of occupants   And have no right to move in, until and unless you evict through the courts or tenants decide to end tenancy.

Yes, even if outside with huge removals van and screaming three kids 

That previous owner sold with tenants probably means they knew they didn't have necessary paperwork to evict 

Don't forget to serve notice(s) compliant with s48 ; s3.  Or no rent due (s48) and possible fines and criminal charges (s3).

Good luck.

I don’t think this necessarily holds. The sellers haven’t provided vacant possession and so haven’t held up their part of the sale agreement. It may be that a competent solicitor advises you to go down the route of a frustrated contract rather than accept becoming landlords.

silvercar

One more thought. Do you have a mortgage? If so, your solicitor was also acting for the mortgage company and they to require you to be owner occupiers and to have vacant possession. So your solicitors can’t just walk away.

Neil49

What details in this respect were provided by the selling agent (assuming there was one)? 

GDB2222

So, at least, the people who sold the house to you were the actual owners. It could, just about, be worse!

You have been defrauded. The sellers lied about giving vacant possession. I don’t see how a conveyancer following the standard procedure would uncover that. It needs someone on the ground, and the conveyancer never visits the property. 

Being super cautious, I have always gone round to the house I was buying on the morning completion was due and checked that the sellers were actually moving out, but most people don’t bother. 

Amazingly, given the gaping holes in the system, it is very rare for things to go wrong.

GDB2222

silvercar said:

Even if the sellers are in Australia, I would think there is every chance their solicitors are in the UK. Maybe their solicitors weren’t aware of the tenants? Your solicitor should be acting for you, I would put in a complaint if they failed to deal with the situation.

The sellers were fraudsters, and the conveyancing process doesn’t work to uncover that,

user1977

If your current solicitors aren’t willing to act in the dispute (there’s no conflict prohibiting them from doing so, but they’re not obliged to - it would be a separate, chargeable job if they did anyway) then find another one who is - either via insurance or you have it or otherwise.

It isn’t the job of either solicitor to check who is living there or whether they’re moving out - if a vendor signs up to a contract which obliges them to procure vacant possession on the completion date, it’s assumed they’re going to do that, whether by moving themselves, their family or their tenants out in time.