30+ years qualified solicitor and founder Julie West explains issues that crop up when buying a house on an estate, especially where the estate was built recently
Buying a property on a private estate should give you control over shared spaces, limits on building/noise/use, plus shared services and maintenance. However, these schemes are complex and title defects with individual properties damagethe value of the whole.
Defective documents and impossible deadline
Terms were agreed and all seemed straightforward. But we discovered that the original transfer deed omitted to grant a right of way over the private road. Then we found that all the original transfers for the estate were defective. Our solicitors had to contact the original developer to organise a deed of variation. The seller imposed an impossible deadline and this could only be achieved if we took the initiative and drafted the documents.
Managing agents employed by the estate supplied inaccurate and misleading information, and imposed requirements for documentation that our deeper investigation showed to be wholly unnecessary.
What’s more, a restriction on the title required third party consent before we could register change of ownership at Land Registry. That third party was a company intended to manage the estate and a SUDS - sustainable urban drainage system. This company was unresponsive for weeks.
Our solicitors has to make a case to Land Registry for the restriction to be disapplied due to inactivity on the part of the company.
Deadline met and defect cured
Julie West
Founder, 30+ years qualified property solicitor
Our clients were able to meet the deadline and secure the property because our solicitors cracked on with tackling every legal issue.
We also cured a serious title defect that would otherwise have caused major problems with a future sale or mortgage.
“We are in and very happy! I just wanted to thank you for making a potentially stressful process really as painless as it can be!”