Anyone what neighbours from hell 2005
An elderly couple bought an old house in rural area and a few years down the line the church guardians sent them a bill for 6000GBP for repairs and upkeep of the church.
Apparently the deeds go back to when the surrounding area was church property and the house was and still the property of the church and whoever bought the house is responsible for the upkeep of the church and its repairs.
Get out quick is my thoughts. :-(
This crops up fairly regularly in uk.legal (a couple of times in the last two years i'm sure) - it should be highlighted in the deeds and the conveyancing when they bought the house IIRC, and they would have been well aware at the time of purchase what it entailed.
Most people who get caught out by these fees pretend they didn't think it applied to them.
A common clue is why the house so much cheaper in relation to non-church property in the area...
"Colin Wilson" wrote
If the conveyancing agency didn't pick it up - now that would be interesting! Presumably they would be liable for payment, at least during current ownership.
Phil
Not a new problem!
If you Google for "Chancel Repairs" you'll get lots of hits - including this one:
On the contrary, it is invariably *not* in the deeds - but nevertheless applies because it is what is called an "over-riding interest".
That is all due to change in 2013 - after which people buying property will not have that liability unless it is explicitly registered in the deeds.
Buying my house, something came up about this. It was in the deeds from the mists of time - houses were on former church land. But nobody had tried to collect the (very small) charge for years, and the same for lots of houses in the vicinity. Since if anyone tried to collect, it would affect hundreds of homes, and there would be civil unrest, and also the sum was about 1p a year at todays rates, I think if was agreed to just forget about it. Not even an indemnity insurance. Simon.
My thoughts are that this is why estate agents and lawyers have insurance.
If this was not made clear to them at point of sale, they should sue the lawyer/estate agent responible for doing the searches.
So is there a possibility of someone buying a property, and then being told "you have to pay xxxxxxx" without anyway of knowing that prior to the purchase ?
no more than uncharitable money-grubbers.
The URL also remarks that in many cases no definitive answer can be given by a diocese.
For some houses, the solicitor can assure the purchaser that there is no risk (either because of the parish the house is in, or possibly because the house is too new). For other houses, you can take out a one-off insurance policy (typical cost =A3150).
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