Neighbour dispute!

[Ab15]

Hi!

We have confirmed in our searches when we bought our end of terrace house that there was no right of way around our property. We have this in our searches and it doesn’t exist in our land registry or deeds.

However the people in the middle have come to us with they’re paperwork that says the tenant or the landlord can use a right of way but they own their property as well so surely they would be titled as the occupier. This was in their land registry.

Why would it appear in one and not the other?

I’ve asked our solicitor to look into it because I want to put a fence up next year so I can secure my garden.

Their paperwork states they can go in either direction but they accidentally told us the other direction who are council properties have blocked that direction.

I feel like I’m going round in circles with it and the solicitors are taken forever to reply.
Please can someone give me some advice!

A right of way (easement) can appear only on one set of deeds. I had the exact same thing. Your solicitor should have checked the neighbours deeds in the searches.

You can have the easement extinguished only if the dominant ( your neighbour) agrees. However, they have to contribute to the upkeep of the path that they have the right of way along.

By the way, tenant in legal terms can mean owner too. So you are the servient tenant in this scenario.

Have a look on the Garden Law website. There is a whole section on rights of way.

A friend of mine was in an end terrace. The other owners in the row had right of way through her garden- right past her kitchen door! I's be standing outside the door having a fag and someone would walk right past me. Even if they were having a barbecue or just sitting in the garden, it was so annoying.

So how does it make it legal if it is only in one persons deeds? Surely it would have to be both?

Why does it make them the dominant?

I’m just so confused because it should exist on both of it was a legal thing?
I have no idea what I’m going to do because I wouldn’t have bought the property if it was in existence. Can my solicitors be sued for this?

Your solicitor will have produced a report for you before you exchanged contracts. Check what is in that report. I doubt you will be able to sue because they always put the onus on you to check the situation on the ground, but you never know. It costs solicitors pence to check all the local title registers and plans and this should have been done for a terrace. Out of interest, did you use a local solicitor? Sometimes local knowledge is key - a local solicitor will know that there are often rights of way and will check them.

Can you fence your property in such a way that the neighbours can still have a ROW but, say, at the end of the garden rather than past your back door?

The solicitors did do the reports and they couldn’t find the row.
I’m not sure where they are based, our mortgage advisor recommended them to us.
We did ask them to look into it so I’m assuming they would have looked into it as much as possible.
I’ve also just bought a copy of their title plans online and it states nothing about a row in that so now I’m confused as to what paper work they showed my husband the other day?
I can’t fence it anywhere else because their property is a flat on the ground floor but in the middle of the terrace so their garden doesn’t even go a 1/3 of the way down mine.

Get on the phone to the solicitors now, tell them you desperately need an answer as it is holding you up!

Sorry to sound negative but in my experience there will be a right of way through your yard. Is it an old house? A similar thing happened to an old terraced I bought. Turned out the right of way was originally for horses & carts, but obviously as time went on people closed up their gardens with fences etc. I guess it used to be pretty open. Anyway, I put up a fence & had a complaint from a neighbour that he couldn't take his dustbin through. I wasn't even aware that he had been walking through my garden! I just put a wooden gate on with a lock & gave him a key.

The main thing it effects is if you are planning to extend or put up a conservatory. You must still allow the access.

Is there a visible wall way or alley of some sort?

I'd go back to the neighbour and ask for a copy of the document they showed your husband as this will help when you contact your solicitor.

It is untrue that your solicitor should have checked neighbouring titles.

The important document here is the seller property information form was anything disclosed by the sellers? If not and they knew about it they you would sue them.for misrepresentation.

Is there any evidence on the ground which shows a right of way might exist? Eg a gate? If so then the surveyor should have flagged it.

I'm a bit confused as.to what the neighbour has produced to you?

Alaso it's not dominant tenant it's dominant tennement which is the property with the benefit of a right of way. The servient tennement is the property subject to the right of way.

I've re read you posts. If they are a flat and the doc is referring to tenant then I suspect they have produced a copy of the lease.

Unless your property formed part of the original freehold title which the lease grants rights over it is pretty unlikely. I suspect they are a bit confused.

Your solicitor won't be able to give you an immediate answer. They will need to get the file back from the archives, speak to their supervising partner etc.

Totally agree with Blankscreen.

Your sol checks the title to the house you are buying - it's completely not standard at all to start reviewing the title of neighbouring properties. Agree that the Property Information Form needs a good look over! Good luck.

Thank you everyone!

I’ve been talking to someone at land registry and asked if he any advice and he said that he thinks what’s happened is when our property was sold from the council they never kept the right of way on our property, but as the council still own the freehold to the rest of the terrace, including the neighbour in the flat, that the council owned houses still contain the right of way but ours doesn’t because it was never included in the official documents that belong to this house.

So the neighbours have access just in the other direction and can’t access our property without our permission.

I’m still waiting to hear back from the solicitors but it sounds like there was a bit of an error made when the two properties were originally sold.

It’s all so long winded but this is by far the most response anyone has given us back and seems like a reasonable explanation to it all. I don’t think the neighbours are trying to scam us with it at all but something is definitely not right with the paperwork somewhere!