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Original poster

Selling a house but keeping the garage

81 replies

Greenqueen203 · 24/01/2021 08:36

Hi all, my husband put our property on the market last week, so far we have 2 viewings booked.

He’s now decided he wants the garage and to sell the house without it.

Obviously we’ll have to appoint a solicitor and tell the estate agent to remove from the listing but can anyone else advise what else is involved in this process? I have argued it’s going to hurt our sale but at this moment in time he doesn’t want to buy the next house without one (or build one)

Any advice?

OP posts:
Bluntness100 · 24/01/2021 08:39

How can he keep the garage is it on a seperate piece of land and you’re going to change the land deeds?

Raxer26A · 24/01/2021 08:40

You would have to reduce the price accordingly , have you got somewhere to move to ? Is the garage on a separate piece of land ?

SuddenArborealStop · 24/01/2021 08:40

I went to view a house where the owner wanted to keep most of the back garden for his business, it had side access so he thought this was fine. I laughed and walked away. As did everyone at the open viewing and I'm assuming everyone after that, I just checked and it hasn't sold in the ten years since that happened....
Not exactly the same but you will get similar reactions.. The above house was heavily discounted too

VettiyaIruken · 24/01/2021 08:47

Is it attached to or on the same plot as the house? Will he need access over what will then be someone else's property?
If so, my advice is tell him he's being stupid.

Literaryseed · 24/01/2021 08:49

It will cost you considerably more in legal fees. You'll have to split the legal title which will likely involve a surveyor drawing up plans for the land registry plus additional land registry fees to register the new title. Plus it will reduce the value of your property and put buyers off. All in, it'll cost you a fortune in time and money.

StandardLampski · 24/01/2021 08:51

I rented a house a few years ago that had a detached garage. It was a terrace... so the houses were in a row, and then the garages were in a row behind, with access down a side passage.
We rented the house but the owner wanted to keep the garage for their things....

It was far from ideal. House had a big front and back garden... we had no where to keep gardening items. Certainly nowhere in house for a lawn mower.
House had pretty limited storage so found it v frustrating

It would really put me off

NoSquirrels · 24/01/2021 08:51

How odd. Why does he have want to do that?

Unless it’s a detached garage that’s more of its own outbuilding/office/dwelling with a piece of land you can easily separate from the main plot of land the house is on, with its own access, then that won’t be possible.

Popsy321 · 24/01/2021 08:51

Is it separate to the house or attached. Have you found your next house. Does it not have its own garage. Is it local to your current house.

Bluntness100 · 24/01/2021 08:53

You need to provide more info Op

The only way this can work is if it’s on seperate land. Even then you need to change the land deeds and need to get your solicitor and mortgage company involved (if you have a mortgage) and then the property needs to be revalued

If it’s on the same plot as the house is on, he can’t be expecting someone to live there and he comes and goes to the garage, that’s batshit.

pilates · 24/01/2021 08:54

You are limiting your buyers. Quite ridiculous really. Just buy a house with a garage.

BrieAndChilli · 24/01/2021 08:56

I imagine it will cost you similar if not more in legal fees and reduction in value of house as it will to just build a new garage at your new property plus the garage (unless you are buying your neighbours house) will be miles away!
I think you need to explain the position of your garage a bit better eg is it at the end of a drive (so you will also need to remove the drive from the sale further decreasing the value plus no-one wants some random walking down the side of thier house at all hours plus probably access to garden is via the drive in a lot of properties.

Of course you may come on and say it’s a 50 acre property and the garage is a mile down the road from the house!

NoSquirrels · 24/01/2021 08:56

If it’s a temporary storage issue, can’t you just rent a storage unit?

Veterinari · 24/01/2021 08:59

Weird how your husband seems to make all the decisions unilaterally.
He's decided to sell your home and now is deciding to keep a part of it. What do you want?

evouk · 24/01/2021 09:04

Better idea is for your husband to rent a garage and sell your house and garage together.

If he goes ahead and doesn't include your garage in the sale it will make the sale harder in an already tough time

Gensola · 24/01/2021 09:05

I wouldn’t even consider this arrangement as a buyer - why doesn’t he just rent storage or buy a house with a garage?! It sounds very weird to me.
We looked at a house where the access to the garage was across neighbours land and that was an immediate no from me, never mind if the garage belonged to someone else!

Bluntness100 · 24/01/2021 09:06

Ok so the land deeds were changed when we bought this place, it’s a lengthy process

Firstly if you have a mortgage, you need to speak to them first, the deeds need to change befor you can sell it.

Once their lawyers agree, your own solicitor needs to send it to the land registry with the revised plans. Thr land registry updates it. At that point your solicitor, the mortgage company solicitor and the land registry solicitor needs to approve it.

You will need to put in seperate access to the garage and the house garden.

When that’s done, you can then sell the property at the revised valuation,

Bluntness100 · 24/01/2021 09:08

Oh and you also need to take it off the market, and be aware of any costs in doing so based on thr contract with the agent

Original poster
Greenqueen203 · 24/01/2021 09:12

Wow a lot of harsh responses on here!

So the garage is on a separate piece of land, on a block, you have to walk a way to get to it so it’s not connected to the property apart from the deeds. The new house doesn’t have a garage.

OP posts:
Candleabra · 24/01/2021 09:13

Unless your house is a large estate, where you will still retain private access to the house, plus other storage, this will put so many people off. Plus the time to separate things legally as @Bluntness100 says.

Chasingsquirrels · 24/01/2021 09:13

Lots of old authority housing have garages separately in a block away from the house.
Our first house (ex MOD) was a semi and had this.
Our current road has a block of garages at the bottom.
Apart from the legal issues of sorting separate deeds, for which there will be a cost, I can quite see that you could sell the house and keep the garage (which are generally unused and poorly maintained).

For a house with its garage attached to it, or even detached but on the same plot - no way.

Chasingsquirrels · 24/01/2021 09:17

I would think the deeds can be sorted as part of the sale. Our house was built, along with next door, on the site of a knocked down pair of post war prefab semis. The boundary was changed and the deeds include the deeds of both semis and they both form part of the sale.
You'd need to speak to your solicitor.
And very aware it might restrict your pool of potential buyers.

Velvian · 24/01/2021 09:17

Can't you just buy a house with a garage? Is is that he can't be bothered to clear it out and pack it up?Grin

Seems a mad idea. Can you give a bit more detail?

PanamaPattie · 24/01/2021 09:18

On the face of it- the idea seems a bit daft. You would have to pay for separate deeds, change the land registry etc. I assume you will live far enough away in your new home - so you won’t use the garage for parking. If the garage is used for storage, it’s an expensive shed.

ILoveMyMonkey · 24/01/2021 09:18

We have a garage en bloc, the house down from us knocked their garage (the end one) down and created a parking spot instead. It hasn’t affected their sale at all, not having a garage.
You need to appoint a solicitor to separate the garage from the house deeds but that’ll be easy enough to do.
Are you planning on living nearby though? I can’t imagine having to drive a way to get to my garage to get something. And our garage had an attempted break in (they cut round the lock but we’re disturbed and never got in luckily) which we only found out when a neighbour knocked - being en bloc it can be weeks before we go near the garage; living elsewhere you would have no idea about any security issues etc.

If it were me I’d make it a priority to find a house with garage rather than hang on to one elsewhere.

LetMeOut2021 · 24/01/2021 09:19

It’s not that difficult to spilt the title off. It’s just a TP1 (transfer of part) rather than a TR1 (transfer of whole). Aslong as the sale price exceeds the amount due on your mortgage it’s not an issue for your mortgage lender either, they’ll discharge the whole charge as normal when it’s sold.

Some purchasers might ask you to register the garage as one title prior to the sale, but practically there’s no reason too. It’s no different that plot sales on new build estates. Each plot is transferred from one larger plot until eventually the whole thing is spilt up into individual title numbers.

It’s totally possible and really not all that unusual. Best to approach a property solicitor with commercial and residential experience. We deal with this kind of thing all the time.