restrictive covenant - could lose our buyers. Please help!

[choxaloud]

We recently accepted an offer on our 20 year old house and had our offer accepted on another. Following the survey of our home our buyers became concerned about the restrictive covenant which said that caravans were not permitted on the drive as they want to park a motor home there. The original developer no longer exists and have been taken over by another company. Caravans and motor homes are parked at various properties on the estate. There is no remaining building land on the estate. Our solicitor suggested indemnity insurance but before we could proceed with that our purchasers had directly approached the new company. They questioned whether parking a motorhome would breach the covenant and because of this contact (even though it was made without our knowledge or permission) our solicitor has told us that indemnity insurance is no longer an option. What can we do to protect our sale? If we approached the new company would they be likely to give permission i.e. over turn the original covenant? We are desperate not to lose this sale and also the purchase of our new home.

We have recentky bought a house where a cobservatory was built with no permission and the original company no longer exists.we were happy with the indemnity insurance. I am sure there is a way around this.
Why dont you post in the legal section where you will get some expert advice.
Sorry not much help,hope the sale goes through.

You can't get indemnity insurance for a known issue ie. if they say no. If the company retains an interest then it is down to them to enforce, although chances are they wouldn't bother. So it would then be a judgement call by your buyer .

I assume the other houses on your estate/road were also built at the same time and by same developer?

If so they will probably have the same restrictive convenant in their title.

Now it will all come down to the wording of the restrictive covenant.

Because it may be that the beneficiary of that covenant isn't just the original developer but also all the other residents on this estate/road. In which case your neighbours could enforce this and no motor home/caravan can then be parked there.

I can't obviously read the covenant and I have no idea if you are freehold or leasehold either (which will matter to an extent).

It may also be that the land your estate was built on was part of one parcel of land and that there is a Head Freehold.

I own a Head Freehold where I can enforce restrictive covenants on 10 other households. Mine include prohibitions on building any additional detached buildings, altering roof lines, keeping roof tiles in particular banded colours etc but also I could be forced to let my neighbours sheep graze in a specified part of my garden every May (yes really!)

Our house is over 200 years olds and the neighbouring houses are a mix of Victorian and Edwardian. I was advised when we bought that most of the 76 Restrictive covenants were still enforceable including the sheep grazing.

So what I am saying is that however ridiculous it may seem, it may still be valid.

I don't know how many houses are on your estate but if you are all in agreement you can have a restrictive covenant dispensed with if you are all equally able to enforce it. However where there is a head freehold situation it's much tricker.

Not much help I'm sorry.

You need to ask your solicitor who the beneficiary of the covenant is. And is there a Head Freehold as beneficiary?

If the beneficiaries are your neighbours. Don't immediately rush around asking them if they wou,d be willing to ditch the covenant. Even if they are it still has to go to Land Tribunal which is a lengthy process.

Again sorry it won't help if your sale but if you're fully informed at least you know where you stand..

Thank you all, it's clearly a complex issue. There are a few things we need to clarify with our solicitor tomorrow and it's really helpful to have the additional info as support.

Good advice from others above. In practical terms your buyer needs to decide what risk there is of other residents on the estate wanting to enforce the covenant. If others are already parking caravans and no one has bothered then it speaks for itself. A motor home is a motor vehicle in law and not a caravan. If the buyers are purely worried about parking their operational motor home then this covenant is not relevant to them. Your solicitor will always recommend an indemnity policy because its easier and cheaper for them to do this and get the fee in for the title transfer than drilling down into detail. Kind regards.