Buying a house from the Church of England

youth_leader

I do think the disruption, noise and dust of the new builds would be very difficult to live with.  I am driving past a house building project at the moment and the lorries always seem to be reversing with the alarms going off. 

I hadn't realised that the air space covenant was for cabling - this bungalow has all sorts of cables attached to it. awful during Storm Arwen and later storms.  As someone that had to sell their Listed II because of lack of money to meet the maintenance costs when widowed, I always shudder when I see someone looking to buy one.  My late husband was on £100K plus with bonuses, it was just never enough.

lincroft1710

Greenboots said:

The other oddity is they wish to retain ownership of land below 1m underneath the property 

Which would indicate they wish to retain mineral rights which is not unusual

Chief_of_Staffy

So they want to retain ownership the ground beneath the house, the airspace immediately above it, control what building work you may or may not perform, after charging you for the privilege, and they'd also like you to absolve them of responsibility for any rotting corpses that you might find festering under your petunias. Sounds like a great deal, good luck.

user1977

Chief_of_Staffy said:

and they'd also like you to absolve them of responsibility for any rotting corpses that you might find festering under your petunias.

But if they're six feet under then they'll still be the church's problem... 

doodling

Hi,

lincroft1710 said:

Greenboots said:

The other oddity is they wish to retain ownership of land below 1m underneath the property 

Which would indicate they wish to retain mineral rights which is not unusual

Retaining mineral rights wouldn't be too unusual but disclaiming liability for contamination whilst also retaining anything below 1m could lead to some interesting legal conundrums.  For example, if the land was contaminated and the contamination originated from greater than 1m depth then (a) whose responsibility would it be and (b) could the OP sue the church for nuisance if it affected the 1m depth he owned?  Taking another example, what happens if subsidence occurs - did the lack of support to the building arise in the 1st 1m depth or below - if it was below, is the church liable?

And then there is the question that arises if the property has a cellar - where is that 1m measured from?  Is the cellar floor church land - do they have a right of access to it?