Just discovered my home not on UK Land Registry

watermeadow

My house has no deeds. I asked the Land Registry but all they have are the two most recent changes of ownership.
My house was built in 1820 and I’d love to know more about its origins.

This is a problem with the move to using the Land Registry. Deeds are fascinating documents full of extra information about your property’s history and its former owners. Land Registry documents tell you virtually nothing.

What is more, the LR plan doesn’t guarantee the correctness of the property boundaries shown; if you get involved in a boundary dispute you need your deeds as vital evidence.

My house has no deeds. I asked the Land Registry but all they have are the two most recent changes of ownership.
My house was built in 1820 and I’d love to know more about its origins.

Dylis

We have the original, beautiful deeds. Written on parchment in long hand and include historic information such as an inclusion we are not allowed to keep pigs in the garden! Also copies of all searches, ever carried out on the property.
I am concerned that these (not copies) have to be sent to the Land Registry. I hate to think of these becoming lost in transit.

Ours are the same, make fascinating reading, but I was horrified to receive them through the post from the solicitor not even by registered mail and in a tatty old envelope which was torn, exposing these (to me!) precious documents held together with string and old rubber bands.
When I complained to the solicitor she said they weren't really important as they have everything registered on line!

We are in the same position, but we had all of our deeds, and land sales paperwork etc, and our neighbours are registered, so we thought it would be a very simple thing. A friend recommended a solicitor and we handed everything over. She told us it can take up to a year for simple cases and more for those without provenance. Two years and NOTHING.

My DH contacted them directly and they could not be more helpful. A form to fill in.

If you have copy of deeds, sales paperwork these are essential. Especially if it contains a plan. Your local planning dept may have a street plan.

If your developer or your solicitor are still around, they may be able to help with previous sales info.

Your land may also be registered as a whole site if you are on an estate.

If your neighbours are helpful they may be able to let you have a copy of their registry.

I thought this was only if you had land that is already registered with them though bikergran?

Moved to new build in 1999 so it is registered.

But also something to consider you can register with the Land registry(free) and they will keep eye on your property in case anyone has sort of shown interest in it (as in any scams) especially if you own outright.

I get a notification every 6 mnths that they has been "no interest" in my property. Not sure if you can check when ever sort of in between.

Our deeds say that if we (or our neighbours either side) cut down any mature trees on our land then the whole of the parcel of land (on which the three houses are built) would revert to the marquess who originally owned it.

We have the original, beautiful deeds. Written on parchment in long hand and include historic information such as an inclusion we are not allowed to keep pigs in the garden! Also copies of all searches, ever carried out on the property.
I am concerned that these (not copies) have to be sent to the Land Registry. I hate to think of these becoming lost in transit.

I'm a lawyer! There's no need to worry if you've got all the deeds and I would not recommend that you try registering the property yourself. We had clients who did this recently and because they didn't understand the importance of some of the documents, whilst the property is now registered the Land Register could have been much more informative. In any event please don't start the registration process now as it is currently taking the Land Registry at least two years to register new titles and as another poster said, it doesn't stand in the way of selling the property so the buyer can then deal with the registration.
It might be prudent to find a local conveyancing solicitor who is familiar with un registered title deeds (i.e a solicitor of advancing years!) who for a one off fee will just check that your deeds have everything that will be needed so there is no panic when you come to sell.
If your land is not registered and the deeds are lost, this is not insurmountable but, again, the sooner you get a solicitor with appropriate experience to start gathering information, the better.

Be very careful if you want to keep your deeds safe. Our building society changed owners and thousands of deeds were lost . They must be somewhere but no-one knows where the location records are. We were assured that once registered the digital copy would suffice but land boundaries are far more detailed on the originals. We are hoping there are no disputes in the future.

KathleenE. Did you have to send off actual deeds. Just don’t fancy sending our prewar deeds off anywhere. We bought the house in1973. We have a Land Registry No on the front so thought that was that.Even wrote the number marked Land Registry in the telephone book.

Our house wasn't registered and we decided to do it ourselves. We thought it would make selling our house easier if we want to sell, or if our children wanted to after we died. I understand that it makes the process of selling longer if it isn't registered and we feared that it therefore might put people off buying. I didn't use a solicitor and we didn't have any problems with the process despite solicitors websites saying it was too difficult for people to do it. There are instructions on the government website of what to do. It took nearly a year after we posted the documents. But it was a good sense of achievement and an awful lot cheaper than paying solicitor's fees.

I worked for solicitors in 60s. Cabinets were full of property Deeds. May be worth trying if solicitor can be tracked. Decades ago families seemed to stick with one solicitor for any kind of legal matters.

As an executor for a deceased relative's estate, I have had their unregistered, 123 yr old house to sell. They purchased th ehouse in 1963. In our area, no estate agent will list it, and no mortgage lender will consider giving a loan to a buyer for such a house, until it is on the Land Registry.

Apparently there is currently a long waiting list to register a house, but it is better to get on with it and do it now, because waiting to register a house once you are needing to sell, will hold everything up.

You also need to know where the original deeds are, because without those you cannot register the house.

Once the Land Registry knew that I was dealing with an executor sale, they kindly said they would try and speed up my application and make it a priority, but that it would still take a while.

Anyway, good luck, Dylis.

It is advisable to get the property registered to stop anyone claiming your land. It happened to a family member who lost part of her garden to a builder who claimed it causing problems when it came to selling the property and costing a great deal of money to get it corrected at the land registry

Not really a problem, and not a problem if it's left until you pass away, as long as you have the deeds and your executor knows where they are. My mother passed away last year, house wasn't registered as she had lived there since 1974, no problem selling it because when you sell a house the buyer has to pay to have it registered in their name so it just costs them a little more as it has not been registered before.

This is a very timely post!. I checked the land registry last week after seeing Facebook advice to set up an alert. Our address is on there but no where most of our neighbours have freehold next to theirs, one neighbour and ourselves do not. We bought before the other neighbours before we got the final road and number from the post office. We do have the deeds. I am really horrified that we have to pay! I shall break the news gently to DH!

Narnia this isn’t unusual but the deeds will be somewhere. Many solicitors have deeds of houses bought decades ago held in their safe storage for clients, they should be listed by them if you know which solicitors your FIL may have used. If there is a mortgage then the lender will hold any ‘pre registration deeds as security.
Deeds only need to be registered when an action such as buying/selling/re-motgaging is done, it’s a gradual process. Hope this helps.

Yes Dylis it is long winded and very expensive. We bought our house in 1977, an ex farmhouse and one field (attached) - a different registry for both, but our local Council, tax it as one property, SO MEGA BUCKS. Be very careful, The process to do it yourself is long and not at all easy, plus the costs. Good luck.

We recently discovered my FIL house isn't registered and we can't find the deeds anywhere.
Unfortunately he has dementia so can't help. The LR have been very unhelpful with my Husband!

We recently moved from our house that we bought in 1975. The conveyance solicitor didn’t raise a concern about the land registry and it was sold without any problems 😊

ClicketyClick

As a side note - bought current house nearly 2yrs ago and it took 18ths after completing before I got confirmation from the solicitor that it was now registered at L.R. Solicitor said L.R. are in a mess and struggling. I don't know if solicitor was referring to the local L R. or national? Hopefully just local.

Yes - I found it a bit disconcerting when I bought my new build 5 years ago - for a long while I had no deeds and nothing appeared on the Land Registry! Was it really mine!!!??

Having read this I've sent away for my land registry details to put with my will and lasting power of attorney. I know the solicitor had them when I got divorced and then someone I knew who worked for the land registry people did something for me [but not sure what]. I had forgotten all about it. Not sure that I need a paper copy but I feel happier knowing that I'll have one.

As a side note - bought current house nearly 2yrs ago and it took 18ths after completing before I got confirmation from the solicitor that it was now registered at L.R. Solicitor said L.R. are in a mess and struggling. I don't know if solicitor was referring to the local L R. or national? Hopefully just local.

My daughter bought a house that wasn't on the land registry - It was just under three years ago I think.
The sellers had the deeds and like other sales it was just registered at point of sale.

To encourage people to register, HM Land Registry offers a 25% discount on their registration fees for voluntary applications.
I'd probably do it as that will protect you ftom a fraudulent claim.

I've just looked it up and solicitors tend to charge £500 to £1000 apparently.
The land registry fees currently are:
Up to £80,000 - £30
£80,001 to £100,000 - £70
£100,001 to £200,000 - £170
£200,001 to £500,000 - £250
£500,001 to £1,000,000 - £495
Over £1,000,000 - £830

Hope this helps.