Where are my House Deeds ?

englander

Stupid question alert......

I bought my house 5 years ago in SE Ireland. With usual mortgage/solicitor etc

It has turned out that a bit of the land goes beyond the next door neighbours erected fence and they want to buy that small bit of land off me. Which I have agreed to.

How do I do this ?

Do I need to go to the solictor I originally went to when buying house ?

Where are the deeds/folio of my house kept ? At the bank or with solicitor ?

Thing is, I want to go with another solicitor, will this complicate matters ?

Thanks

Kinetic^

The bank has them.

dats_right

I'll start with the two easiest questions. Yes, the bank should have your title deeds at this stage. Although it has been known for long delays by solicitors in registering and or returning deeds to the bank. Secondly, you are free to use any solicitor you like and no it won't complicate things.

The only problem that I would foresee is whether the bank will actually allow you to sell a portion of your land. You will definitely need their consent to do so and imo that consent will only be forthcoming if the remainder of the land is adequate to protect their security (i.e. outstanding mortgage).

Best thing to do is to talk to your solicitor and get their advice.

godtabh

dats_right wrote:

The only problem that I would foresee is whether the bank will actually allow you to sell a portion of your land. You will definitely need their consent to do so and imo that consent will only be forthcoming if the remainder of the land is adequate to protect their security (i.e. outstanding mortgage).

Why wouldnt they let you sell your land? I've never heard of that before. The value of a small portion of land compared to the over all value of the remainder would I assume protect their security and it wouldnt be something the OP would have to worry about.

There is also the land resistery office to check out your land porfilo

dats_right

I didn't necessarily say that the bank wouldn't let him sell his land just that their consent will be required. Generally speaking when somebody goes to sell their property(if subject to a mortgage) their solicitor has to get a signed authority from the client to 'take up' the client's title deeds from the bank, the solicitor will also be required to furnish what is called an Accountable Trust Receipt (ATR). This ATR is a personal commitment given by a solicitor, whereby the solicitor will be personally liable to the bank if they do not hold the deeds safely or do anything with the deeds that may prejudice the bank's interest. eg. What this would usually mean is that on the sale of the property the solicitor must hold back sufficient monies to discharge the outstanding mortgage. In the case of the OP selling a portion of his property (however small) it will certainly be construed as prejudicing the bank's interest. Therefore, I am certain that the bank's consent will be required.

I am not a banker so I have absolutely no idea whatsoever of the criteria or otherwise that they will require. I can however, say as a trainee solicitor who works mainly in conveyancing, that this apparently innocuos agreement has all the makings of quite a complicated little transaction.

Anyway, best to talk to a solicitor who has all the relevant info at his disposal.

Jo King

A number ofm years ago a friend of mine sold off part of his back garden as a mews site. The lending institution agreed to it but required that he pay a portion of the proceeds off his mortgage. The reason is that as lender they wished to maintain a particular loan-to-value ration

silverside

one thing you should be careful about is that the neighbours don't gain squatters rights over the corner of your land.

seeing as you are in the process of agreeing a sale, this shouldnt be an issue. however if they fenced off part of your land and used it as their own for a long time they might gain ownership by default.

i'm not an expert on this, but its something worth bearing in mind.

The_Conductor

silverside wrote:

one thing you should be careful about is that the neighbours don't gain squatters rights over the corner of your land.

seeing as you are in the process of agreeing a sale, this shouldnt be an issue. however if they fenced off part of your land and used it as their own for a long time they might gain ownership by default.

i'm not an expert on this, but its something worth bearing in mind.

If you check Gay Byrne ended up in this situation out in Dalkey some years ago.... It was only scrubland in his case- but its still in the courts, 12 years later.

grumpytrousers

Pat Kenny actually...:-)

to the OP, and regarding where deeds are, it depends on the registration system you're on. As you're in the South East, it's a safe-ish bet (75:25 ish) that you're on the Land Registry system and as such there are no 'deeds' per se. Rather you have a folio with the Land registry and on that is marked the fact that you have a mortgage with bank xyz.

go to whatever solicitor you want to, he can search for your deeds and get anything he needs (assuming your old solicitor bill is squared up) and bobs your uncle.

if you're on the Registry of Deeds system, then as others have said, your deeds might well be witha bank, altho' that's not a given either!

stepbar

dats_right wrote:

I didn't necessarily say that the bank wouldn't let him sell his land just that their consent will be required. Generally speaking when somebody goes to sell their property(if subject to a mortgage) their solicitor has to get a signed authority from the client to 'take up' the client's title deeds from the bank, the solicitor will also be required to furnish what is called an Accountable Trust Receipt (ATR). This ATR is a personal commitment given by a solicitor, whereby the solicitor will be personally liable to the bank if they do not hold the deeds safely or do anything with the deeds that may prejudice the bank's interest. eg. What this would usually mean is that on the sale of the property the solicitor must hold back sufficient monies to discharge the outstanding mortgage. In the case of the OP selling a portion of his property (however small) it will certainly be construed as prejudicing the bank's interest. Therefore, I am certain that the bank's consent will be required.

I am not a banker so I have absolutely no idea whatsoever of the criteria or otherwise that they will require. I can however, say as a trainee solicitor who works mainly in conveyancing, that this apparently innocuos agreement has all the makings of quite a complicated little transaction.

Anyway, best to talk to a solicitor who has all the relevant info at his disposal.

Dats Right is correct. In effect the deeds are "loaned out" in order for the solictor to carry out his work. Call into your bank. It should not be a problem (it really depends, its the banks call) however it could take a while to sort out.

Dats Right - You reminded me about something I need to follow up on.... Thanks!!

cathorio

Can I ask a question re Deeds??
Recently the deeds of the family home were transferd to my name.
I haven't seen them and neither was I asked to sign them.
Is this "Normal"????

The_Conductor

You need to ask your solicitor.
These things can take time though- I've a meeting with my solicitor to sign papers relating a property transfer that happened in November- next week- over 3 month later.
If you have any questions- you need to ring your solicitor and get them to explain what the situation is.

cathorio

The_Conductor wrote: »

You need to ask your solicitor.
These things can take time though- I've a meeting with my solicitor to sign papers relating a property transfer that happened in November- next week- over 3 month later.
If you have any questions- you need to ring your solicitor and get them to explain what the situation is.

The deeds in question have been transferd to my name....yet I wasn't asked to sign anything. The only correspondence I had from the solicitor was to inform me the deeds were now in my name and a bill.
I asked him if I needed to sign the deeds or other documents and I was told "No"!!
The solicitor has the deeds.