Anyone purchased an unregistered property

[theclampits]

And how long it might take for it to be registered with the land registry with no original deeds? Our vendors are having to send a ‘statement of truth’ to the land registry because their solicitors have lost the original deeds. We haven’t even had the draft contracts and then this has only been discovered in the last couple of weeks. Very annoying !

The trouble is you don't know for certain that they own the property, or own all the land with the property. It's clear that they have lived there for decades, but any amount of shenanigans may have gone on in the past. Hopefully it all goes through simply, but it could be that there is someone else out there with some claim on the house or the land.

Another thing I’ve just thought of is when I put my house on the market (with the same agent) I had to prove I owned the property and send my title deeds. So now the fuck have the vendors managed to put theirs on the market ??

That is a very good question!

I agree, it's very strange it's been allowed to get this far into the sales process.

I'm incredibly skeptical about it only taking a few months and being able to expedite the process but you never know. Our case was very simple and straight forward with loads of very good evidence of ownership over a 30 year period but still took 18 months.

How long are you prepared to wait for the property?

Hi,

I have been through exactly this process last year (bought a house built in 1950s, from owners in the 90s, who had not registered the house with Land Reg and had lost the original deeds).

It was a stressful process, but we got there in the end and did not delay things by too much. Start to finish from offer to move was 5 months.

Vendors went through of process of demonstrating their ownership of the house through sworn statement and by supplying evidence of ownership e.g. council tax records for 15 years.

House was then registered with Land Reg using an expedited process (turnaround was 10 days) - conveyancers can apply for expedited process where it is holding up a house sale/chain. No issues being accepted for expedition.

House was registered and sold to us with limited /presumed title - this is my lay person understanding! I believe this means there is some remaining risk that the vendors duped us and the "real" owners with the title deeds are out there. That needs to be legally accounted for, even though the risk is remote. If these "real" owners exist, they can claim the house within ten years of our purchase date. We were given an indemnity policy as part of the sale to cover us if this comes to pass. But obviously based on the evidence they've had to supply to get to this stage, it's HIGHLY unlikely. It's worrying, but you have to really think through - is that a likely scenario given what we know about this sale? It seemed very unlikely that two 90+ yr olds are falsely claiming ownership of a house that they'd raised their children in since the 1950s.

Once ten years pass, we can apply to land reg to re-register us with title absolute. Everything reverts to normal.

If we sell within ten years, the clock does not restart for the next owners, they can apply once ten years from our purchase date. We do not intend to sell in the next ten years so this is not a huge concern for us.

Hope that helps! Our conveyancer said it's uncommon but certainly not unheard of and will soon die out as an issue now all houses need to be added to land reg.

The current owners should apply for first registration of the property and then use the inward sale to you as reason to expedite. There is no charge for expedition and it should be looked at within 2 weeks

I’d presume that’s what’s going to happen anyway isn’t it in regards to it being registered in their names first in order for them to sell it ?

Hi thanks for this ! I’m confused though, when it was given a title was in title absolute ??

@ThatLoudSquidoh also did you have a mortgage ?

Lots of wrong information on here.

The Land registry won't charge extra to expedite the application if it's causing hardship as it is here.

The seller will get possessory title which will be backed up with indemnity insurance. There's no way round this.

Hi, so they won’t get title absolute ? Even with their proof of ownership and statement of truth ?

Yes - we had absolutely no problems getting a mortgage. We are with a major lender and they did not bat an eyelid.

In response to your other question, we own the house with a possessory title which was the title granted by land reg to the vendors during conveyancing, not a title absolute. You can convert your title to absolute after ten years so long as no one turns up with the lost deeds and claims rightful ownership (which we felt was highly highly unlikely in our scenario).

No they won't but it's not an issue.

@ThatLoudSquid is spot on.

Do NOT trust what your estate agent says! You have no comeback with them but you do with your solicitor. If you’re not satisfied go to a different firm.

Apologies it might actually be 12 years...can't quite remember.

The main point I want to convey to you is it sounds a lot worse than it actually is, it all got sorted within a reasonable time frame, and whilst the estate agent was clueless, our conveyancer was non-plussed by it.

It's an unusual situation but this legal process exists to fix it and you will get security via indemnity insurance until you can convert to absolute title. You don't need to supply additional evidence for the absolute, just lack of contest in the time period is enough.

We did not feel it was worth pulling out and losing our home for once we understood it more in full.

But I’ve been told on here I won’t get our mortgage ?? You says you’re with a major lender do you mind saying who? Even the estate agent has said if we only get a possesorry title not to proceed. So confused !!!

Sorry that was for @ThatLoudSquid

I don’t think we’d be willing to take the risk on an possesory title. Dh especially is more Cynical than me and thinks the vendors kids might turn up with the lost deeds 😆

We are with nationwide

Even if the vendors children turned up with the deeds, they would have to prove the house had legally been transferred to their ownership...which considering the owners didn't have the deeds to transfer...seems impossible...

And why wouldn't the kids just show up now to stop the sale going ahead?

He thinks to get the inheritance and the house 😆

I just need to know if I’m being led along by the estate agents and if it’s at all possible they will be granted a title absolute with their evidence of living there and a statement of truth ?

This is all nonsense OP. They are elderly and have lost the deeds. It happens. The indemnity insurance is there to protect you should anyone turn up with deeds after the fact anyway.

You'll be granted possessory title as already explained.

Hi, how will it protect us ?

Don’t think we’re happy to do that, the insurance will cost a bomb too