Holiday Let Purchase

[scottishretreat]

Hi, my DP and I have been in the process of buying a little holiday cottage, for our own use, and to let to get some income from it. The current owners let the property (advertised on several websites) and had lettings for much of the summer, so things have moved very slowly with the purchase.

Yesterday I received a bundle of paperwork from my solicitor, which included several different covenant documents, which the solicitor has pointed out affect the property (but has made no further comment on them). They include quite a lot of conditions, many of which concern me, but my biggest worry is that several of them state that the property 'cannot be used for any purpose other than a private dwelling house'.

A quick (amateur!) look on the web seems to suggest that this means we are not allowed to let it out as a holiday let, and that a council took an owner, who was letting for a small number of weeks per year, to court in such a situation, and was able to get an injunction to stop him.

That would mean that we would not want it. We do love it, but cannot tie up that amount of money just for us to visit it a few times a year – and we wouldn't want to leave it empty most of the time either. I would also be concerned that, if we could let it for now, but were made to stop in the future, the property would not be very saleable with that restriction, due to its small size (not really big enough for a permanent home by today's standards).

There are various other issues aside from those in the covenants, e.g.:
Land Registry records for neighbours show the whole garden of the property belonging to them, not the house we were buying – other maps have been provided which show the boundary we expected, but the legal status of these is not clear...
Planning consent for the property required that surface water should not drain into sewers, but the Drainage and Water Enquiry showed that it did.

My instinct is to stop the purchase and find something else – can you tell me if I'm over reacting, and these are minor problems, or should we run a mile?!

Walk away and find something else. It sounds like it would become a money pit for you

I'd say ask your solicitor but if they are anything like ours they will give lovely vague answers! You could talk to the planning department. Local council should be able to tell you about the legality of letting it. Personally that iand the land registry are the bits that would have me most concerned, drains can be rerouted,

I wouldn't continue.

Thanks! The property is a garage conversion next to the owners house. We are awaiting a copy of the planning permission for that conversion, but I've also just noticed that one of the early documents for the overall plot states:

'Not to develop the property in any way save that the property can be developed and used as a single private dwelling house with ancillary garage private parking spaces and private gardens'.

My solicitor states that this covenant applies to our property, but it seems to clearly forbid its conversion to a property in the first place! Does planning permission automatically override clauses in existing covenants?

It sounds like the vendors are trying to "pull a fast one".

You are being misled about the garden - if it's not on the land registry document then it's not part of the property.Issues with use, drainage, not beng able to rent it out (could you get insurance?), that garages are commonly constructed from inferior materials than houses fact that the previous owners live right next to you and are chancers.

No, I would walk away from this, but if you were determined to go ahead then reduce your offer based on lack of garden.

Thanks Lenina, you're confirming my view on it!

If the garden wasn't definitely part of it, we wouldn't want it - it would mean the only outside space was the gravelled parking space - except our right to use that isn't on the land registry view either...!
I'm pretty sure now that its all too complex and peculiar for us - its just frustrating to have waited all summer to find all this out now

We have the opposite problem - our wonderful solicitor is ultra cautious although actually we keep using him because he doesn't let a single thing pass by. My son bought an insurance policy about rights to repair the local church even though the law changed to remove the obligation in part, on his advice which is a small risk still. He also bought an insurance policy about the map being a bit unclear - the garden plan seems to give a sligthly inaccurate drawing of the situation about access between the two house son the terrace - my point is that some of these legal risks you can spend £100 and insure against which is how it is dealt with. Others are so risky it is just a straight - no do not proceed.

Eg the sellers could apply for retrospective planning permission for a holiday let if your solicitor advises that planning consent is needed and then you only exchange if that permission is obtained. And/or if there are doubts about the garden a new deed is signed by the owners of the land it was moved from clarifying that which again the sellers pay for. A thorough good solicitor should be doing all this and recommending it all. In addition they write a detailed Report on Title before you exchange which goes through all this too.

OP, fucksakefay and Oldie2017 are talking sense. Ask your solicitor about theses issues!!

(I still have a hunch on what you said that the vendors are being chancers though!)

Walk away now! Too many problems.