DIY property searches what's involved?

propertyrental

Any charges or rights of Way would normally show up on the Land Registry Title. £3 from the LR.

https://www.gov.uk/search-property-information-land-registry

user1977

Mark300zx said:

Is there a way of checking for land pollution myself as a google search seems pretty sketchy?

Depends what sort of "checks" you want. Buyers tend to just get "desktop" searches which will tell you about historic land use and highlight landfill or potentially contaminative industries etc - though a garage is probably a red flag in itself as you don't know what oil etc previous occupants may have spilled.

If you want to know what's actually in the ground then you can get intrusive surveys to drill out soil samples and send them to a lab, but that's a bit over the top even for buying a house.

GDB2222

When we bought this house nearly 30 years ago, we checked for prior land usage. This showed precisely what we expected, which was that the area had previously been farmland. But, the information was not very detailed. So, it might have been a field, or it might have been a pig sty. 

My recollection is that it was called an environmental search. 

ss2020jd

Some options for residential searches. I know a garage isn’t residential but you can get an idea.

https://www.groundsure.com/residential-searches/

GDB2222

I'll quote a post from a different thread
by  @ConLandProf:

You can find out the available information about the site your house is on via services like Landmark or Groundsure..  You will need to pay for their reports.  As other respondents have mentioned the local authority will have the planning documents on its planning portal and any conditions related to it.  However, this may be hard to find if you do not have the historic name for the area that was redeveloped.  Your local authority should have a "contaminated land officer" who should be familiar with the site history and ought to help you find the information you seek.   Be aware that some remediation work can be limited in its effectiveness, as may be the input of the environmental regulator, so question the CLO closely.  (I tried to give you the links but the site blocked me).

If you take an insurance route take care to ensure the cover does not have exclusions for land contamination.  Many policies do. 

If you are having difficulty getting the help you need, then you might want to consider contacting a local councillor to complain.  

I personally would not buy the house if the vendor is unable to give you a coherent response about its land condition.  Without good information you are at risk both of your house losing value and of taking on a remediation liability (if further work is needed) as you would become a "site owner" under the "Part 2A" legislation.