Very old conveyance

[Isit2021yetplease]

We are purchasing a detached freehold house built in the 70s. It comes with a Conveyance from the original vendor which is barely legible at all (it comes with a note from the land registry confirming it’s the only copy they have and they’re aware it’s v poor quality). It talks about things like not being able to keep pigs on the land or having caravans for people to sleep in on the land etc. It also has a barely legible sentence about requiring approval from the original vendor (who is almost certainly dead by now) before any extensions are done and you have to pay them £2.75 for it....
Obviously this is all so completely out of date and the fact most can’t even be read...how much notice do you take of these? I don’t intend to keep pigs but I would like to extend! And don’t want to have to seek someone who very likely died a couple of decades ago to give them £2.75! Has anyone come across this?

I would risk having some pigs sleeping in a caravan in the garden for the sake of £2.75

Not entirely sure that is the question you were asking!

But seriously, ask your solicitor. Ours had covenants about not painting the door or having vans parked on drives. But we bought when the house was about 6 years old and our solicitor said the developers really wouldn't care once the last plot had sold.

You should be able to get an indemnity policy to cover any extension, which will protect you in the unlikely event of any comeback from the original owner/descendants. Your solicitor will advise you of the best way forward

We're not allowed any "additional temporary or permanent structures, including sheds, advertising boards, etc.", both of which the house currently has.

What’s the date on the conveyance

It’s really common for leases to be really old and have random stuff in it. I had a flat lease once that said I couldn’t play the pianola between certain times or keep chickens in the bedroom and that I had to redecorate in full every 3yrs and the colours had to be chosen by the freeholder

Oh and needless say all the weird stuff was ignored, even my solicitor said it was all pretty standard nonsense!

Those are called restrictive covenants - in theory the benefit of them (ie the right to forbid you to extend) could have passed on to somebody, but in practice it’s very unlikely they would ever be enforced, or enforceable.

What you need to do is:

1. Don’t discuss them with anybody ever! If you chattily mention them to a neighbour that could make them realise their uncle or whoever has the benefit.

1. Ask your solicitor to get a quote for restrictive covenant indemnity insurance. It will be pretty cheap, because the insurance company knows these covenants are very very unlikely to be enforceable. But if you’ve ever discussed the covenants with anybody that could invalidate your insurance.

I wouldn’t worry about them so long as you sort out insurance.

Hahahahaha

Seconding the Indemnity cover.

I had this situation two years ago with a Conveyance that went back to 1910.

My Solicitor arranged the Insurance in case a descendent ever tried to enforce one of the totally irrelevant covenants.

Great will look at indemnity insurance thank you. The date is 1970 I think - so not that old, but the quality is so bad and the language so old it’s impossible to actually make out almost a single full sentence.
Love that you can’t keep chickens in your bedroom @Pineapplemonkey!
Such funny random restrictions people put in!!