Substation ownership

[ForTwinklyJadeBiscuit]

I have a very difficult problem that I'm trying to sort out. We had sold our house and the sale was progressing but then the buyer's solicitor came up with Land Registry document stating that we did not own a piece of land to the front of the house. This stopped the sale. I have been in touch with the National grid and UK Power Networks - both of which say they don't own the land. The land did have an Electrical substation on it but I don't have any paperwork stating when this was removed and by whom. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance.

If the land registry says you don’t own it, can they say who does?

Have your been using the land? If you can prove you have been for a certain period (7 years I think?) and not been challenged, you can claim the land as your own under adverse possession rules.

Your solicitor is probably best placed to advise on how to proceed.

I haven't been directly in touch with the land registry but I'll have to give them a call. Thanks for suggesting. My solicitor said I would have to get in touch with the solicitor we used when we purchased the house but I'll try land registry first. Also, apparently you have to have been in situ for 10 years and we've only been in 9 years before you can claim it as yours. Thanks for taking the trouble to reply.

I lived in a house with a sub-station in the garden and I understood that I owned the land and the electricity people paid a peppercorn rent for it. (which I never did see!)

I think the electricty people had a Property Department which looked after these things and I would image that they wouldn't want to own little bits of land all over the country (for which they might have to pay rates / community charge on) and rented would suit them better.

(I suspect this is of no help to you though!)

There may still be cables underground there, protected by a wayleave. But this should have been discovered by your solicitor when you bought the land.

Well it may be - perhaps the arrangement was the same ?

I would get on to the Land Registry and try and find out who owns the land.

It would certainly be an issue for me as a purchaser, as there is a possibility that if there was a substation there in the past and someone maintains rights to have one there there is no guarantee that they might not want to put another one there in the future. Or rent the land out for a mobile phone mast or something.

Have you seen the LR plan? My parents used to own some additional land that was outlined in red — along with the main property — on the LR plan. When they sold the additional land it was just outlined in green on the plan. So you could see that they had once owned it, but did no longer.

I believe that electricity companies do like to own the land on which substations are built, but they transfer it back for a nominal sum if no longer needed.

You can buy the plan for about £3 from the Land Registry site.

Thanks for all your comments. They've helped.