Adverse Possession...

[Icanflyhigh]

Posting here for traffic.

We are about to complete on a property purchase and our solicitor has discovered a parcel of land belonging to the property but not registered with Land Registry.
Our solicitor has advised vendor needs to sort this and expedite the matter with Land Registry before we complete - expediting with a pending transaction gives a 10 day window for LR to either register the land OR raise any queries, at which point the clock resets to a further 10 days.

As the buyers, we can overrule our solicitor and complete the adverse possession after the sale is complete, meaning we can exchange tomorrow and have keys possibly Friday/Monday.

AIBU to want to forge ahead tomorrow?
For context we only saw the property 8th October so we're only about 8.5 weeks since offer accepted which I know is a shorter timescale than most, but there's no chain and it's a deceased estate we're buying.

Am I just being impatient and should wait?!

Personally I would wait

Obviously the timing is crap, but you do need to wait.

If you are buying with a mortgage you may have to wait as the mortgage company may not be happy with the situation.

If you go ahead it is v risky as the seller has the information about the adverse possession history to sort out the issue with the land registry. After you complete the seller will have no incentive to help you sort it out and you may find a neighbour objects to the AP claim.

If you're happy to lose that parcel of land after paying a bunch of fees and adjusting fences (if relevant), then go ahead. If you want to keep it, then this is the best route.

Would you even have the rights for an adverse possession claim once the transaction completed? Do the rights of adverse possession pass from owner to buyer?

And is it actually adverse possession? Or just a parcel of unregistered land owned by the deceased estate proven with a Conveyance or Deed of some kind. Depending on which depends on what I would do.

Is the parcel of land a deal breaker? If the price you have agreed is minus the land or a fair price without the land, I think I would proceed and then manage it yourselves… that is, if the solicitor will put in writing that you can claim adverse possession after completing.

If you are buying with a mortgage it will have to be reported to the lender. If you aren’t, you can do what you want although it would be advisable to wait for the seller to sort it out.

As another poster has mentioned is it actually adverse possession or was the land meant to be included in first registration? If it’s the latter, the seller’s solicitor needs to gather all evidence that a mistake was made and apply to rectify the register. If its adverse possession, the sellers will need to submit evidence the land had been used by the sellers uninterrupted for the last 12 years with a Statement of Truth and supporting documents. Once the application is with the Land Registry, you might be able to proceed on an undertaking from the seller’s solicitors to assist with any requisitions the Land Registry may raise. You will not be able to deal with this post-completion as the seller needs to provide evidence of ownership, not you, in order to make a claim.

Thanks all, you've confirmed what I already knew, I think I just needed to be told!

I'm bloody impatient at the best of times!

The parcel of land is within the boundary of the current fence, there's quite a few of them in this settlement area unregistered and they're referred to as ransom strips.

I don't think the estate agent will be happy, but i will be telling them today that we will wait for the AP to be sorted by vendor. The poster was right when they said the vendor will have no incentive to sort this post completion and they are the ones with the information.

The poster who said this woukd need to be reported to mortgage lender too was right and echoing what solicitor said too.

So, now we wait!!

Why would you potentially give up rights to a parcel of land, however small it may be?
Property sales should never be rushed and you should definitely let your solicitor do the job he was paid for.

In years to come, you'll thank yourself for being patient when the land goes up in value.

So just to update - vendor solicitor applied for adverse possession week before Xmas and was granted an expedition as there is a pending transaction against the property and to delay could affect the mortgage offer.

We're now over a month down the line, nowlt withstanding Xmas, the survey was done a week last Tuesday and report was scheduled to be submitted LAST Friday (not yesterday) but it hasn't.

No one is getting any update from land registry and their website says 11 months standard processing - by which time our mortgage offer will have expired.

Anyone any experience of Adverse Possession, Land Registry etc

Even better, does anyone work for LR and could give a swift kick up the ass to whoever needs to process the report!!

It would be unethical for anyone that works in the LR to look at it and be cause for dismissal. You can ask your application to be expedited and state that you need it to process it before your mortgage expires. However if LR is waiting for the survey there is nothing that can be done before that survey has been uploaded on the LR system.

We were on the other side of this (sellers). We had to get all the previous owners in the last 12 years to legally confirm the land had been like that during their time owning the house so we could apply for adverse possession. The survey then happened and it was reported back on quickly. However we did then have to pay for an adverse passion indemnity policy to cover the buyers until they can fully apply for ownership of the land.

how did you get on with this? how long did it take in the end.. we are now in a similar situation. a piece of land between the road and the drive of the house we are trying to buy is unregistered and we have 3 months ticking away on the mortgage offer as the lender wants adverse possession before they will proceed.

We happened to find out 2 years ago we didn’t own garden we had been lead to believe we did, and considered adverse possession. It’s not as cut and dried as applying for AP and the land becomes yours. The actual
owner has to be found and asked if they agree to relinquish the land, they only have to say yes or no, no explanation required. The commonly held view of ‘7 years and it’s yours’ is not true. In the end we bought the land, which stung a bit since we’d genuinely thought it was already ours, but now it’s all above board and watertight. Took LR 18mtgs to draft the new deeds, but was legally ours before that.