I’ll try to keep it as simple as possible. Been to look at a house this weekend and when we arrived the back garden is about 4 times bigger than shown on the advert. The extra lump is what was a rented allotment, the house has been in the same family for 60 odd years and was rented by the owners. The current house owners have applied to acquire the land via Adverse Possession / statutory declaration and are 7 years into the 12 required. If we were to buy does anyone know if we would continue the 12 year process or would we need to start over again?

Can’t help. But for future posters it might be handy to say where you live. The law might vary between Scotland and the rest of the UK.

It’s mainland UK.

I’m not a property lawyer, but my understanding is that with unregistered land, the twelve year period is not timed for one person only, so predecessors’ experience can be included. You would get the current owners to write a Stautory Declaration regarding their seven years so that you can then make your application in another five. Think the current form is ST1, but await correction from another STWer.
Requirements are fourfold:
(a) factual possession of the land
(b) intention to possess the land
(c) possession is without the owner’s consent
(d) the above has been true for twelve years
I’m not sure why one would apply before the twelve years have elapsed – perhaps they made an application that was rejected and the LR determined that just the last seven years were valid?

But for future posters it might be handy to say where you live. The law might vary between Scotland and the rest of the UK.

It’s mainland UK

🙄

Manchester if you need to be so accurate

I’m not sure why one would apply before the twelve years have elapsed – perhaps they made an application that was rejected and the LR determined that just the last seven years were valid?

It’s a bit complicated as a payment has been made in the past for rental of the land. Apparently the land is shown on the land registry within the properties boundary but not on the deeds.

Perhaps, the rent stopped being paid seven years back and has never been demanded since?
Being shown on the Land Registry is at odds with you saying it was unregistered land, One for a solicitor with sight of all paperwork?

Manchester if you need to be so accurate

Scotland has its own legal system so what you have in Manchester may be different it it occurred in Dundee.

Yep it’s all abit odd. The land was rented from a allotment society …given its location etc I can’t see why it isn’t registered

If its on the land registry then its part of the property. You need to check that. Its £2 to download the plan and another £2 for the title. Easy to do yourself, 5 mins online. If it is on there you then need to make sure that is what you are buying. Even if it is one property you can still buy part of it and do a part transfer.

given its location etc I can’t see why it isn’t registered

Registration costs time and money, and with the land not being in personal ownership, I can see why it’s remained unregistered.

It would help if you clarify a few things:

Do we assume that:
1) The house and garden are shown in the land registry
2) The “land” has no entry in the land registry*
3) The “Owners” have owned the house and garden for 60yrs
4) The Occupiers rented the house from the owners for 60yrs

Qus:
The Land was rented by the Owners or the Occupiers from the Allotment Society?
Does the allotment society still exist?
When was the last rental payment made?
Has there been any communication from the Allotment Society since?
Has the “Occupier” or “Owner” continued to hold possession of the land and excluded all others?

When you say that “they” have “applied to acquire the land via Adverse Possession / statutory declaration” what do you mean? You dont normally undertake any actions until the 12yrs has passed.

* this occurs if there has been no qualifying transaction in the land since 19?? and so no conveyance has resulted in the land being registered.

IANLACS (I am no longer a chartered surveyor, and this stuff is right out on the fringe of what I remember from university)

1) The house and garden are shown in the land registry
2) The “land” has no entry in the land registry*
3) The “Owners” have owned the house and garden for 60yrs
4) The Occupiers rented the house from the owners for 60yrs

1 – I’ve not downloaded anything yet but the current owners say that on the land registry the plan shows the house, garden and the extra land within its boundary but the extra isn’t on the deeds

2 – not checked this yet

3 – the house has been passed thru a family for 60 odd years and the current owners grandparents rented the allotment for years and used it as a extended garden mostly.

There has been no rent paid for the extra land for at least 7 years while the current owners have been there. To be honest if you didn’t know the allotment was there you’d just assume it’s private gardens as they are enclosed down between 2 rows of houses so there has been no challenges for ownership/rental etc. The allotment society still exists and are aware of the house owners wanting to take ownership and they have no issue with it.

The allotment society still exists and are aware of the house owners wanting to take ownership and they have no issue with it.

Then Im not sure this counts as adverse possession.

This will definitely need proper advice from a conveyancer. If the house and garden AND land are shown in the land registry, the deeds ought not be particularly relevant anymore.

If the allotment society are “aware” there is nothing adverse about it, and could be simply done by conveyance for a lot less bother and cost.

The allotment society still exists and are aware of the house owners wanting to take ownership and they have no issue with it

I think that may counter point (c) and frustrate a claim, but being shown on the LR would indicate that the allotment society would have to make an application to correct the Registry.

Edit: beaten like a rented mule.

As above if the current owner is aware and happy for you to take possession then you can’t claim adverse possession. It should be much easier. A couple of land registry forms and a couple of hundred quid in fees. I’ve no idea why they want to do this with land that must be worth thousands though.

Yeah apparently the estate agents said the property would be worth at least 10k more with it

As above if the current owner is aware and happy for you to take possession then you can’t claim adverse possession. It should be much easier. A couple of land registry forms and a couple of hundred quid in fees. I’ve no idea why they want to do this with land that must be worth thousands though.

Where the land is positioned it isn’t really useful as anything else as you couldn’t get rows of houses in it and a road etc so it’s just been forgotten over time I think

The allotment society still exists and are aware of the house owners wanting to take ownership and they have no issue with it.

That surprises me a little, but if it is true – why wouldn’t the owner simply agree to buy the land for a token sum rather than go through the uncertain and potentially risky approach of adverse possession (especially with the potential that a new committee at the allotment soc may have a different view).

One possible reason is that the allotment society doesn’t actually own the land but simply rents it, and another is that there are restricted covenants that preclude the society from selling its land. In fact if the land has an official designation as an Allotment then I have a memory it cannot be sold off without government approval (to stop council’s flogging it for housing). You(r solicitor) needs to check the Allotments Acts. [Note not all Allotments are actually legally protected as such]

Another problem is that if the “allotment society have no issue with it” I don’t think it meets part (c) of drlex’s test above.

Although you are presumably paying a solicitor to represent you in the purchase – they will be better placed to advise than IT professionals on a bike forum!

Although you are presumably paying a solicitor to represent you in the purchase – they will be better placed to advise than IT professionals on a bike forum!

Obviously but there does seem to be 1 or 2 individuals on here with good advice and experience. We only viewed the property yesterday so nothing has been started yet. We didn’t want to be on the situation where we found out after buying the property we would have to start the 12 year process over again or loose access to the land which I doubt tbh.

Sounds very odd, the land does have a value as you’ve said an agent has suggested it adds 10k to your property value.

I’d be asking my solicitor to approach the society and offer a few k to sort as a proper tramsaction

No experiance of this, but I do know when we bought our house the deeds were out of date (talking about annual maintenance changes for verges on the estate which had since lapsed). Surely the land registry takes precidence so if it says the land is part of the house on that then it is, even if the allotment society think they own it?

We didn’t want to be on the situation where we found out after buying the property we would have to start the 12 year process over again or loose access to the land which I doubt tbh.

Well I think you definitely need to discuss that with your advisors who have professional indemnity insurance if they get it wrong. Personally I would be surprised if the 12 yr rule could be passed on, and I certainly wouldn’t be surprised if the allotment society suddenly became difficult or it turns out the council own the allotment (and let the AS manage its day to day running) and the council have a very different view.

Unless it is sorted before the purchase I would make the assumption that you don’t own it and it is simply a bonus if you either eventually own it or get to use it foc. As I understand it, even if you are 7 yrs into the process all the legal owner has to do is turn up anytime in the next 4y11months and attach a sign / notice to the fence and you’ll have no “case”.

even if you are 7 yrs into the process all the legal owner has to do is turn up anytime in the next 4y11months and attach a sign / notice to the fence and you’ll have no “case”.

I think they would need my permission (assuming I bought it) to do that anyway as I’m 99% sure the only access to it is thru the property

so having now downloaded the land registry files the part of land that is in question is marked out separate from the allotments in the area, the outlined area the house is on does contain the land but the boundary of the property doesnt include it …..

I’m confused. The copy of the title plan should show the plot outlined in red. Anything sold out of that plot will have another colour outline and a different title number marked. One can have parts of the plot subject to rights, and these will be coloured in. Additionally , the plot can have rights over other titles; again, usually marked & coloured on the plan. The copy of the title entry on the Register should decode the plan, or reference other titles / documents that do.
One can obtain a map showing all titles around the one that interests you, and it indicates unregistered plots.

yep the plot is in red … there are allotments marked to one side of the property … and then the random square that is in the garden …. is this other map available on the land registry?

Sounds very odd, the land does have a value as you’ve said an agent has suggested it adds 10k to your property value.

anything an estate agent says can be taken with an once of salt.

anything an estate agent says can be taken with an once of salt.

Goes without saying but given the plot is the same size as the house boundaries again it’s probably not far off

I think they would need my permission (assuming I bought it) to do that anyway as I’m 99% sure the only access to it is thru the property

You might want to read the deeds first. Often neighbouring properties will have a right of access. Can it not be accessed (even if it involves climbing a fence or fighting through brambles) via the neighbouring allotment?

Not directly relevant to ownership in question, but Land Registry Title Plans are only indicative- it says so on their website, and so cannot be relied on with any boundary issues without consulting the surrounding land registry documents and details in deeds.

Boundary positions cannot be assessed with any degree of accuracy by looking at the Title Plan, as is most people’s expectation. Boundary information has to be sifted from the Land Registry documents for the properties each side of the boundary. This is not usually a straight forward exercise but it is the best way to proceed

And

When neighbours have an issue with regard to their property boundaries they immediately turn to their Land Registry Title Plan in the belief this will show their boundary positions. The Plan usually does not, however, becausue the Land Registry are obliged by statute to show boundaries in a general way only, without measurements, and without precision. There is usually no single document that will show boundaries with precision

We have had recent cause to realise this when our neighbours used their Title Plan as a site plan for a planning application. The title plan was not accurate, ours were a little more accurate but different to theirs and this led them to having to adjust their plans and reapply for planning permission when the accurate dimensions were found in our respective deeds.