Abandoned properties?

aardvark0

I live in sunny Somerset and have a good job, but since 3 bed house prices are on average 5 times my salary I am stuck with renting.

In my village and in nearby towns there are properties that appear to be abandoned; they look very run down, curtains always closed, weeds growing through the doors etc etc.

I understand that it is possible to find out who owns property by paying a small fee to the land registry, but if the person has passed away and not left the property to someone what happens to the property?

Is it possible to find out the estate holder in this circumstance and maybe negotiate? I would presume not or the house would already be up for sale.

In this circumstance does it just sit empty for the rest of eternity?

I know that in Newfoundland Canada if a property is not left to someone in a will then it goes back to the Crown.

It seems a shame to have these apparently abandoned properties.

Does anyone have any hard info on this?

Ted_Hutchinson

Landlord zone with links to squatters rights site
I should think if you asked the planning office or local farmers you'll soon find who they belong to.

aardvark0

I am aware that it is possible to find out who owns a property (See my original post), and I have absolutely no interest in squatting.

What I was trying to ask was :-

If a house belongs to someone who has died with no surviving relatives, is that house likely to be "ownerless" from the point of view that it has no living owner? What happens to it?

Assuming it does lie empty (and in the above ownerless state), is there some (legal) process that can be undertaken to reoccupy it?

I have heard that councils in the North of England sometimes take steps to 'take over' unnoccupied properties, with a view to improving neighbourhoods, but I really don't know anything more detailed about this.

Any more views?

cattie

If a person dies with no surviving relatives & leaves no will, his estate goes to the crown I believe.

Somerset

The property will have an owner. Rules of intestacy apply if no will, ultimately with Crown at bottom of list ( as cattle said ) if no relatives traced. Could be that an executor is taking a long time to sort out an estate, complications, family disputes etc. Could be an owner in a nursing home so can't be sold until owner dies. Could be lots of different reasons for property to be uninhabited.

As you said you could do a land reg search and get the most up to date ownership details, but they may not actually be up to date ie if owner has died solicitor dealing with estate won't update land reg until estate finalised.

With regard to the North of England thing, just sounds like a CPO situation. If a council wants to rejuvinate an area it'll CPO whatever it wants to. Large companies can too ( eg if Tesco want a superstore ). They need Sec of State approval, are large scale and very expensive. They really apply to area's not individual houses.

lush_walrus

I was going to answer, but the exact answer is above by somerset so all I will do is second that!

Compulsary Purchase Orders are what are being refered to incase you dont recognise CPO. Genrally these happen when an agreement can not be reached between a small land owner and a settlement from a big developer masterplanning an area of multiple occupancy.We are presently working on a project in Brentford, where this process is going through. Many owners of the land have willingly sold to the developer for a premium, but one small company has refussed all offers mainly due to the building itself (and land) being worth far less than their relocation costs. They are in a specific manufacturing industry where legislation about how they produce has changed and where they are fine to continue theway they have in the building they are in they will be required to purchase millions of pounds worth of equipment if they start from scratch at a new property. Therefore the developers can not offer them what they require, but after 3 years a CPO has been put in place, and as a result the company will be out of business.

Very very rare that a CPO will be used, but if one small plot stands in the way of regeneration of an area and a master plan, it will happen. You will not find any individual houses that can be lived in purchased under CPO, as they are as a rule purchased for the sole purpose of demolition. However, occassionally the circumstances that you will are when plans are altered 3 years or more after a CPO, eg: when a motorway was due to be routed along a particular route containing houses and then after CPO the route was altered, rendering some of the purchases un-necessary. These such propertys do come back up for sale, but via agents (sometimes auctions) and are not bargains, baring in mind most have been vandalised and left to rot!

If i were you I would talk to the people local to the house, agents etc, they will definately know somethng of the owners, somebody always does, and this is a well used method in small property developers. It could be that it is owned by a relative that is paying no attention, or could even be owned by one of these companies who lend money against houses for elderly home care payments. If thats the case, they can not touch the house till the person has passed away, and as such a house can fall into disrepair.

Research may get you there, but I doubt it will be as simple as checking on Land Registry site, if it were someone would have done it.

Phonix

Besides soup kitchens and short change, makes you wonder why homeless peole wonder city streets. Take a trip to the country and who knows what you'll find.

aardvark0

Thank you very much for that - all my questions answered!