Unregistered patch of ground in the middle of our right of passage to our home .Will it affect sale of property.

[Banemore]

We are living in our house 20 years this year, built on a site given by Father . We are considering selling this house and moving closer to our local town. We are worried about this unregistered patch of ground left to my brother in my father's will. I'm not quiet sure my brother will register this ground as it could come at a big cost it has not great value as it over grown full of bushes.

We do have a mortgage on our home with one of our pillar banks and didn't have any issues getting it 20 years ago but this has showed up in my father will. Any advice greatly appreciated

 

[TomEdison]

I'm not sure that I see what the problem is.

Your father gifted you some land. You developed it by building a house on it. You now wish to sell the land. So far, so good.

Your father bequeathed a seperate plot of land to your brother. Your brother has not registered this.

So what? How can this affect your land, or the sale of your land? What are you worried about?

 

[Banemore]

My driveway is passing through this plot of land on the way to my house.we are living here since 2005 and got a mortgage on this property, My real issue is would a bank or engineer flag this as an issue to someone buying my house?????

 

[TomEdison]

When you say this plot of land is unregistered, do you mean:

(a) your brother has not registered himself as the owner — anyone looking in the land registry will see your father as the registered owner; or

(b ) the land itself is unregistered — anyone looking in the land registry won't find out anything at all?

And a separate question — is your right-of-way over the land documented in any way? When the land was gifted to you, did the documentation also mention the gift of a right of way over the adjacent land?

 

[misemoi]

Any potential buyer with a competent solicitor will advise that the right of way be formalised. This may be something you have to pay for yourself to ensure a smooth sale, so consider it a cost of sale like your estate agent fees or solicitor fees. What you don't want to happen is that you go sale agreed, the buyer is unaware of the issue and the sale drags out and you lose the buyer. The same thing will happen with the next buyer and so on, and people will wonder why a property is sale agreed so long. Best to get it sorted now before putting it on the market. People buying and solicitors advising in rural areas are aware of this types of things so it is not something you can ignore.

 

[TomEdison]

Any potential buyer with a competent solicitor will advise that the right of way be formalised.

It may already be formalised. When the OP says that his brother hasn't registered the land, he could must mean that his brother hasn't registered himself as owner of the land follwing the father's death. The right of way may have been registgered as a burden on the folio in 2005 (as it should have been) and, if it has, we're good. The failure to register the descent of the land from the father to the brother doesn't matter.

But, I agree, if the right of way hasn't been registered, then get it registered. There will be difficulty in selling the OP's land before this is done. OP may have to offer to pay for the costs of getting this done; nobody else has any incentive to do it, and OP is the one who benefits from it being done.

 

[Banemore]

The legal eagle told my brother it is one for long possession and a figure of 10k ....it could take years to solve ..I am hoping they is another way around this that for one will be much shorter time frame and less cost...the ground is worthless and goes back to my grandparents time , left to my father but never registered.Myself and my wife living at the end of this road since 05 and next to us is our home place.Time will tell ...Thanks for all of the advice much appreciated.

 

[bkenn14]

Hi Banemore
Is there a tax Issue driving up the cost of registering, Can you get a breakdown of the 10K...... Cost,

 

[Banemore]

To answear the question,:
land never registered and looks like no name on it ever .The driveway is on the map , and we have a right of passage to our house but lack of ownership in this section in the map in yellow. Looks like its time to get working on it .
Thanks for the advice.

 

[Dr Strangelove]

The driveway is on the map

That looks more like a moat