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"Shared drive"

5 replies

LIZS · 24/09/2006 12:50

Legally speaking how does a "shared drive" operate ? House we've looked at has drive passing through its land - the house is one side main garden the other - which is also access for a further property beyond the detached garage of the house. It is described as a shared drive, rather than the second property having a right of way over it, so wonder how the driveway land would be registered and arrangements regarding its maintenance would work (for example, cost to install lighting which would be of equal benefit).

tia

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Kaz33 · 24/09/2006 13:26

Well someone has to own the drive and if it is not one of the house owners then probably owned by a third party ie: freehold company. This could be owned and is likely to be owned by you and the other house as shareholders. You would no doubt pay a service charge or share maintenance costs.

The other possiblity is that a totally removed third party owns it, maybe with the house owners paying rent.

No way of knowing without seeing the deeds. You can do an index map search with the land registry for a minimum fee. This will show who owns the drive. Ask estate agents to ask owners, that would be the best way I would have thought.

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nikkie · 24/09/2006 17:17

my grandparents have a shared drive and theirs is 50% each but they are on either side of it rather than an access rd.
We did look at a house years ago where the house owned the road but other houses used it for access. Think it would have to be looked up just to make sure if you were going to buy it.they can also cause problems ifyou didn't get on with the neighbours!

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TheBlonde · 24/09/2006 17:23

As Kaz said it'll depend on the deeds
My parents have a shared drive
They own the land but the house in front has access rights. It's not the best arrangement and has caused issues in the past

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calpopscalum · 27/09/2006 21:11

We had one in our last house. Don't do it!! It was a bl**dy nightmare and has put us off for life.

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Sunnysideup · 27/09/2006 22:13

just don't go there is my advice - my PIL actually moved house because of neighbour problems centred around their shared drive, and to our complete surprise, in our last house, our nice as pie neighbour went COMPLETELY ballistic when I dared to block him in the drive (he wasn't supposed to park on it anyway, only had right of access to walk across it!) and he was totally abusive and horrible, caused real probs.

Just don't get involved with 'em!