To be absolutely furious with house seller

[ChagSameachDoreen]

Our house sale/purchase has been limping along for a fucking eternity (November 2020, to be precise).

We offered on a property in February 2022 which was finally accepted. Took the seller an age to find an onward purchase, but luckily our buyer (young, first-time) was willing to wait.

We had a completion date set for September 12th - perfect, as our buyer's mortgage offer expires end of Sep, and we have religious holidays starting on Sep 24. I was just waiting for confirmation to book a removal company.

Today my solicitor calls and says there's a hold up. The title of the house can't be transferred to me yet, as the seller's ex-husband's name is still on it. Since she doesn't speak to him anymore, it has to go through the courts, and nobody has even the vaguest clue when it might be completed.

ONLY NOW THIS HAS COME UP?

I am fucking raging.

Has anyone been in a similar situation, and if so, how long did the courts take to remove the other person off the title?

Well my DS's girlfriend is going through an extremely amical divorce, all sorted and just needs rubber stamping....it's 2 years on and still hasn't happened, the courts are mega busy. Don't expect any action for another 2 years.
I'd get shot of this palaver now. Its not going to happen.

intrigued by this thread. I divorced in 1987 and have just been informed by a solicitor that my name is still on the deeds of the house. Ex is selling after all these years and they tracked me down. In 1987 the judge said “don’t be stupid girl ofcourse your names not on the deeds”. Turns out I was right 😀

Wow - if this is the case, it would be amazing.

However, we haven't exchanged contracts yet. We were supposed to on September 12th but then this came up.

Also interested to see the comment about the restriction- there is a difference between the ex still being a registered proprietor (which is why your first post said) and having an interest protected by a restriction, which happens in all sorts of circumstances including divorce. In fact everyone with a mortgage has a restriction on their title too. OP - if you have a copy of the title you can check, but if not get your conveyancer to confirm either way. If it's a restriction that's why your conveyancer is more relaxed.

Just spotted this update. All much more normal. It's a shame your conveyancer didn't explain this a bit more to you OP and put your mind at rest. Probably still a delay but not a deal breaker

From what you're all saying, this is way worse than I first thought...

I'm afraid so, but there's no point in people sugar-coating a situation that's fast becoming a nightmare and isn't likely to improve

Luckily you said you're prepared to hang fire on moving, and that may be no bad thing - not least because things may become clearer around the general economic mess

no idea how it got to this stage and very sorry that it has for you.….from limited experience with my sibling, you can’t put a house on the market without both home owners consent, so maybe a forged signature somewhere along the way?

Worth new posters reading the updates - it's actually better than it appeared initially. Not joint proprietors, just a restriction.

I’m not saying it can’t be the other way round, but isn’t it usually the case that a matrimonial home rights notice is applied for by the wife when the house is in the husband’s sole name?

I was thinking more that they'd owned the house jointly, with an agreement for one to live there after divorce with children, until they were adults. Then the house to be sold with the equity shared in specified proportions. So the restriction would protect his interest in the house. I trained as a property lawyer though, not family law, so is that not what normally happens?

Oh how can you have waited so long??? I think you may as well just put it in the hands of the gods now as you have spent so much time, there is nothing to gain by throwing in the towel if you would only stay put anyway.

Fingers crossed it is the easier version not the years of waiting!

Very strange. Usually estate agents and solicitors are very quick to check you indeed own the property you are attempting to sell as part of their due diligence - that would include confirmation from all individuals listed on the title.

So how this property got to market, the seller got signed up with a solicitor and how many months to have passed before they said “actually we don’t have permission from all owners of the property to sell it, we’re going to have drag it through court” is nuts

DH and I had a look at other properties in the area online, and there's nothing within our price range.

So we are going to wait it out, at least for a month or so, to see if this gets sorted. If the buyer of our flat pulls out, we will just have to find another one.

You could work it to your advantage and say you'll wait, but only if you can renegotiate the price as the market has dropped.

Wasn't a search done? You can look up ownership very easily and cheaply through the Land Registry (I've done it myself, you don't need a solicitor to do this). I'd look for another house. It sounds as though the vendor's ex-husband doesn't know the house is up for sale and may well have a legitimate interest in the property; she may well not be in a position to have accepted your offer or proceed with the sale. Cut your losses and look for something else, but query why this wasn't known before? It's not your problem if the vendor and her ex aren't talking, but it should have been known who owned the property. You might have cause for an official complaint.

If a search was done back in July I’m surprised your solicitor didn’t bring it up earlier. Anyone can go on land registry for about £7.50 and get a copy of land registry documentations which would include the other persons name… surely at that point the solicitor goes ‘who is that?!?!

no matter how long it takes through the courts, if land registry need to do something they are way behind at the moment and thing are taking ages.

Ah well. It is what it is. Either continue to wait or buy something else.

We had a similar issue on a purchase. A few days before completion but after exchange our solicitors realised another party was also named on the deeds. In our case it transpired that this other person had died many years previously so our case was easily settled. It took about 10 days for our solicitor to sort it all out. I know your case is more complicated, I hope as things are already motion with the court etc they will move quickly for you.

So you wouldn’t check the deeds to see who owns the property until a few days before exchange? Really?

It now seems that there isn't a mis match on the registered proprietor, instead it's a restriction on title which is much more usual and an undertaking is a standard way to deal with that. OP explained in a later post - her first post doesn't correctly reflect the issue.

What is the difference between 'a restriction' and someone else's name on the property? Have never heard of this. ExH 'owns' 20% of my home after our divorce 😔

Hope all turns out well for you OP. Probably best to hang on for another month now. Shana Tova.

Ah thank you!

We'd ordered a sukkah for the new house for Sukkot. DH has just cancelled the order 😭

No word from anyone yet today. There's a distinct lack of accountability anywhere along the line.

The title register has three parts - the first section is who owns the property. That's the registered proprietor. In the next section you can have a restriction on the title - it reads something like "no disposition of the property can be registered without ...consent of x". That's very simplified as there are some different versions of the wording.

But it's used to protect an interest in the property. So for example a mortgage, an interest in the equity such as tenants in common, or overage (clawback) on a new development. It gives someone else some control over the property and I guess a lot of people don't know about that, but unless you've got the set up wrong it's not usually a problem.

You need a form in a specific format to send in with the application to register the transfer. So in the purchasing process you'll be sent that form after completion. The solicitor will undertake to send it but won't do that unless that have it already.

Alternatively you could remove the restriction in advance but that's no use if the person or company with the benefit of it is waiting for some of the completion moneys!

Where did I say I would only do that a few days before exchange @Doris86 ?

Update from the head honcho at my solicitors, to whom I read the riot act and asked for more details as to how this happened. She wrote:

"The vendor is the sole owner of the property this is not the issue. Her ex-husband has registered a unilateral notice against the property in 2010 (this was probably to protect himself in the case of divorce proceedings and financial issues). The seller would have been made aware of the issue at the time and would have received notification from the Land Registry regarding this."

Apparently, contract paperwork was received by my solicitor on 17th May 2022, however this did not include the management pack which made the documentation complete (the management pack was received on 11th July). Searches were requested in May. My solicitor raised enquiries on the 11th July including a request for the unilateral notice to be removed. They received confirmation that there was an issue on the 5th September (late in the day) and that matter was referred to me yesterday (6th September.)

Also from my solicitor's boss:

"[Vendor's solicitor] did not advise us that there was any issue, they just kept stating "to follow" in their replies. I understand from [my solicitor] that it was in fact the agents who let us know that there was an issue. I have requested that [my solicitor] contacts [Vendor's solicitor] for a full update in relation to the position of the unilateral notice. She wil do this today and let you know once she has received a reply."

So there we are.

Thanks for reading if anyone is still here 🤣