Why can't I have a copy of the deeds of my house?

LittleBook

I need to provide a copy of the deeds of my house to a third party in connection with a development I'm involved in but my bank says that only a solicitor can ask for them.

So apparently I have to go to my solicitor, sign a form authorising him to ask the bank for the deeds, pay him (obviously) and then the bank will give HIM a copy of my deeds which he’ll pass on to me. I think as well that the bank will charge the solicitor who will pass this charge (as well as his own) back to me.

The bank says this is “normal procedure” … is it?

D3PO

sounds odd.

do you actually own the hosue outright or have you got a mortgage on it ?

LittleBook

It's mortgaged, that's why the bank holds the deed. I managed to get my solicitor on the line in the meantime and he said some financial institutions do this some don't.

I guess there's nothing I can do about it, just wondered if anyone else had had this problem and am having difficulty with the logic of bringing someone who has no connection to the agreement I have with the bank into the situation.

Thanks.

Carawaystick

You could go down the data protection route for EUR6.35
If the deed has your name on it, then it's personal information.

There might be an exception in the data protection act for this, if the bank stonewall you ring the data commissioners they're fairly helpful and will tell if a copy should be given to you or not.

Even looking through their website might show up an exception. But the website is terse.

Faolchu

i'm pretty sure teh bank hold teh deeds until you own the house and don't release them til the morgage is cleared. maybe your bank can provide some other form of documentation that will help you

SkepticOne

Faolchu wrote: »

i'm pretty sure teh bank hold teh deeds until you own the house and don't release them til the morgage is cleared. maybe your bank can provide some other form of documentation that will help you

It's only a copy he's asking for.

D3PO

SkepticOne wrote: »

It's only a copy he's asking for.

true but Im sure the bank would be skeptical about why he wants this. Is he trying to secure another loan against this property for example.

doesnt seem unreasonable that they want any such requests dealt with via a solicitor

SparkyLarks

D3PO wrote: »

true but Im sure the bank would be skeptical about why he wants this. Is he trying to secure another loan against this property for example.

doesnt seem unreasonable that they want any such requests dealt with via a solicitor

But why should he have to go and pay a solicitor to deal with the bank. why can he not deal with them himself.

It\'s just adding a layer of bureaucracy and expense to yet another thing inthis country.

Grawns

My Dad in the same situation recently. Deeds can be very long and on non standard paper, and they have to be released from the bank to the solicitor ( charge may apply), copied by someone in the solicitors office ( again charges apply) and then sent to you. Can take weeks. Our deeds go back to 1837 .

Really people should ask for a copy when they are purchasing ( I will next time) as good to have them to hand. Also my last solicitor never passed the deeds to the bank from my property, so I had to go through the law society and hire a new solictor. Long annoying story, Fecks sake!

ztoical

I got sent a copy of my deeds without asking just figured it was standard to get a copy.

BC

I'm with PTSB. They wrote to me recently saying they had received the deeds (even though i bought 2 years ago!) and if I wanted a copy just to give them a call.

LittleBook

SparkyLarks wrote: »

But why should he have to go and pay a solicitor to deal with the bank. why can he not deal with them himself

That's what I thought

Any-hoo, that's the way this bank want to do it so I'm off to the solicitors tomorrow morning.

Thanks folks!

Inconspicuous

Hi,

Saw this thread and just had to reply! Don't go paying a solicitor extortionate rates for something this simple! They don't deserve the money!

As another poster above suggested, go down the Data Protection route. A couple of years back a close friend of mine was in the process of applying for a mortgage. As part of his application he needed to supply a bank statement of transactions on his account for the previous 3 months.

On contacting his bnak they informed him that there would be no problem in doing this but that they would be charging him €15 per sheet of transactions. Needless to say, he wasn't too happy about this and refused to pay.

Instead, under the data protection act, he requested a copy of all the information held on him or related to him on record in the bank. This included every transaction, customer account notes, copies of all cheques, letters, bank statements issued to him absolutely everything that they possibly held that were in any way related to him.

He signed the letter, enclosed a money order for the €6 ( or whatever the fee is that is stipulated in the Act) and sent it via registered signed for post. The reason for this is that once the bank has signed for the letter they then have a certain time period under which they must respond with the information requested.

Needless to say, the bank weren't too happy with the request and rang him to ask what he really wanted. he told them he simply wanted bank statements for the past 3 months which the duly supplied without the €15 charge per page.

I strongly suggest that you go down this route with the bank. Just because the bank sees it as "normal procedure" to only engage with solicitors when asking for a copy of the deeds to the house doesn't mean it's right! I really believe you're taking on extra expenses that you really shouldn't just because the bank as being awkward!

LittleBook

Thanks inconspicuous, I really appreciate the advice and I'll talk to the other half about it

old boy

D3PO wrote: »

true but Im sure the bank would be skeptical about why he wants this. Is he trying to secure another loan against this property for example.

judging by the news recently it seems common practice to have the deeds of one house as security on at least 5 more.

Carawaystick

Inconspicuous wrote: »

Hi,

Saw this thread and just had to reply! Don't go paying a solicitor extortionate rates for something this simple! They don't deserve the money!

...

He signed the letter, enclosed a money order for the €6 ( or whatever the fee is that is stipulated in the Act) and sent it via registered signed for post. The reason for this is that once the bank has signed for the letter they then have a certain time period under which they must respond with the information requested.
...

I think the timeframe is 40 days.

If the deeds go back years, then I doubt they'd be on clean crisp a4 paper.... with a red copy stamp from the bank on them... If people were using these as collateral then the country and banks are fubar....

5Aces

I used to wonder how some people i knew were becoming multiple home owners... did they keep a lottery win or two secret or maybe they had a weekly compo claim or maybe just maybe they were the local drug barons but a system that allows you to use a house you dont even technically own to buy a lot more houses is a gamblers dream and yet landlords are still ripping us off. prime example that s?!t always rolls downhill

JJ

I just bought a house recently and I was still receiving bills for the previous owner from Eircom. I asked my solicitor for proof that we're the owners now and when he told me the deed to the house is about 90 pages long, I told him a simple letter from him would suffice. I made a copy of that letter and sent it to Eircom and I've kept the original in a safe place just in case.

The letters from Eircom didn't end though. They eventually sent a solicitor's letter to our address so I gave Eircom's solicitor the name and number of the former owner's solicitor and haven't heard from them since.