We have been house hunting for a house to suit our needs for nearly 2 years. We found a good match, not perfect but good.
One of the big attractions is the garden. The estate agent's details described the lawn as a boundary to the woodland. About 1/3 of the garden is lawn, the rest is terrace uphill and woodland. We viewed 3 times and asked the agents (who showed us around) about the boundary. We understood the lawn to be part of the property. When we received the initial searches from owners, there was no mention that the lawn outside house did not belong. We walked the boundary with land registry and realised that about 1/3 of what appeared to be the garden, did not belong. The owners have confirmed it is not their land and have commented on the lack of access except via their drive (not entirely true in my opinion as the landowners could clear the woodland and drive through their in a 4 wheel drive) and their use of the land for several years.
We do not want to buy an expensive house with no flat garden (we saw the lawn as where we would put the kids swings etc, now we see the lawn would not belong to us). There is also a water feature (a little stream) which we wished to make safe (it runs into underground tunnels which we were going to grid off) which would not be on our land but outside our front door. My solicitor is unofficially approaching the landowners to see what it would take to transfer the garden. It may put the price outside our range as we are already stretched. We are really upset. We cannot understand why this was not made clear before we committed survey mortgage etc. Now we think we will have to pull out. I am wondering if we will be liable to the fees that the person buying our house has spent. Anyone had any experiece of this- we have a view that the overall cost of the houe is so big that it must be right and a house with no lawn (albeit used by the current owners) will not meet the needs of our family. Thoughts and advice welcomed