My neighbours house is up for sale, and has been described as having off road parking. This is a bit (very!) misleading as none of us have any offroad parking as such, we simply have shared (difficult) access to the back of the houses. It’s a single track road down, and a small path along the back of the houses which it’s just possible to get the car down. As it stands, we manage the access to the back of the houses very well & no-one causes anyone any problems. I want to avoid the scenario of new owner thinking they can park there, if they did it would be a major headache for the rest of us as it’s the first house.

Contacting the owner is difficult – it’s been rented out for the last 5 years and I’ve never actually seen the owner. I was going to go to the estate agent and ask them, but realistically is there anything I can do?

Looks like this (arrow marks where the “off road” parking would be):

It will all come out in the wash as the buyer’s solicitor will look at all the actual rights in the deeds etc.

talk to the agent.

if any prospective purchasers come round to ask about the neighbourhood get it into the conversation ‘of course that shared access drive gives us all access to the back of our houses’

Their solicitor will (possibly, probably not) have made them aware when they did searches.

Otherwise wait and see what happens, and if it comes to it you will have to show them the plans etc which show its shared

What flappy feet said, but no hard in pointing it out to the EA as it could save some hassle (just point out it’s the start of a shared access).

Yeah, cos the estate agent is going to tell a potential buyer the absolute 100% honest truth, they are well known for that.

When we bought the house, it clearly states on our deeds that there’s shared access along the back but I think that really only refers to foot traffic. We even have to allow access over our property (we’re at the other end), despite the fact the it doesn’t go anywhere. You’d hope that any buyer would realise that the access is shared, but people can be silly about things like this (he says…..!)

Estate agent in “full of siht” non-shocker.

Anyone viewing the house will immediately realise the agent is fibbing.

We looked at a house last year, described as having car port & workshop. The “car port” would only have been any use if your car was less than 10′ long, and the “workshop” was on the end of that, also 10′ long by (seriously) about 3′ wide. FFS 🙄

<twitches curtains>

I’d put it in writing, send a copy to the estate agent and keep one for yourself. Best nip it in the bud, if you don’t you just know the new owner us going to park their car there.

Put a no parking sign up to make it clear to any viewers?

It doesn’t matter two hoots what you say to anyone about it, all that matters is what the actual rights in the deeds say, which their solicitor will explain to them. Your opinion on the matter is completely irrelevant.

all that matters is what the actual rights in the deeds say, which their solicitor will explain to them.

If they get a proper solicitor who knows their job,
if they go for the cheapest conveyancer they can find they may not…

waits for the “but the previous owner said he did “this” ” reply from the new owner.

Assuming that’s their garden it looks ideal for a conversion to an accessible parking space. And is that land at your end all yours? Awesome garden if so.

Bottom line is if the owners are selfish, estate agents, deeds, notices etc. are irrelevant, they’ll be a pain. If they are ok the first time they cause an obstruction a polite word with resolve everything. If not good luck. I used to live in a mid terrace of about 20 house. The inbred people at either end seemed to think each end of the cobbled lane at the back was their personal parking and in that situation it was abundantly clear it was not, the dustbin wagon needed access once a week at the very least. People are incredibly selfish about parking as seen from previous threads on here.

You could fit another pair of semis on that garden.

Does that garden belong to the last house? It’s enormous!!

Your garden looks very green. Did you put Astroturf on your dirt jumps?