Would you buy a house with "Sporting Rights" belonging to someone else?

flimflamflo

Hi there,

I'm hoping for a little advice or insight please? We went sale agreed on a house a short time ago. The contract arrived today and it's our first time hearing about "Sporting Rights which are registered as a burden" on the property. Said rights belong to people who are named on the contract - and are not the current vendors of the property.

We're told we can have a statutory declaration re non-exercise of the sporting rights but the vendors will only sign a declaration confirming non exercise of same during their time living there after we close. The part that really concerns me is this: "the purchasers shall not require the deletion of the sporting rights from the title of the property in sale herein."

>> If they don't intend to use them, why the objection to deleting them?

Our solicitor's going through the contract today, but just wondering what people think in the meantime?

Anyone ever heard of this? Would you buy a house with this hanging over it?

Thanks very much, Flim.

Michael D Not Higgins

Just a possibility, but sporting rights may be a basis for a claim against the owner from a change of use. For example, if there were sporting rights over a piece of land which a new owner wanted to remove a section of woodland in order to build something they could claim interference with their rights. For this reason they may want to keep sporting rights in order to have a say over the use of the land.

flimflamflo

Thanks Michael D,

I was wondering about that - the whole plot is garden really - bit out the front is bog and mountain slope, there isn't much you could do with it apart from enjoying the view.

Thanks for that - not sure how comfortable we are with having someone having that kind of input/control.

:-)

my3cents

What type of sport? I can imaging access along a river for fishing as a sporting right but what others are there?

Michael D Not Higgins

flimflamflo wrote: »

Thanks Michael D,

I was wondering about that - the whole plot is garden really - bit out the front is bog and mountain slope, there isn't much you could do with it apart from enjoying the view.

Thanks for that - not sure how comfortable we are with having someone having that kind of input/control.

:-)

I'm not sure on the procedure here, but it might be prudent to ask your solicitor what the options are. For example, would it be possible to speak to the sporting rights holders in order to understand their reasons?

flimflamflo

A bit of googling and no river suggests it's hunting/shooting rights. Which has us wondering about the surrounding land now too.

As Michael D says, I guess it's best to wait for the solicitor - but was just curious to know if anyone had a similar experience and how it worked out.

draiochtanois

This post has been deleted.

spaceHopper

They are happy to sign but not till after the sale? Tell them to cut it out and sign now, the moment they have cash they will have no interest in signing anything. If you have to make a problems with the bank not lending unless they sign.

my3cents

flimflamflo wrote: »

A bit of googling and no river suggests it's hunting/shooting rights. Which has us wondering about the surrounding land now too.

As Michael D says, I guess it's best to wait for the solicitor - but was just curious to know if anyone had a similar experience and how it worked out.

I know people with fishing rights and tbh they are hardly used but the rights could be sold on to someone else who could make a lot of use of them.

I wonder if you should ask your solicitor if the rights over your land could be sold at some future date?

If the same people have the rights on your land and the surrounding land then they may not want an island in the middle to spoil the enjoyment of their rights. It might also be if the rights can be sold on then they are worth more as a whole with your property included than if it is removed?

btw could it be Fox Hunting that is the Sporting Right? If it is then its a bit of a pain if you are against it and you can't exclude them.

L1011

What type of house is it? There's a sporting rights burden on my parents semiD. Never had the laird shooting pheasant in the garden yet!

Peregrinus

flimflamflo wrote: »

Said rights belong to people who are named on the contract - and are not the current vendors of the property . . .

We're told we can have a statutory declaration re non-exercise of the sporting rights but the vendors will only sign a declaration confirming non exercise of same during their time living there after we close. The part that really concerns me is this: "the purchasers shall not require the deletion of the sporting rights from the title of the property in sale herein."

>> If they don't intend to use them, why the objection to deleting them?

If the vendors don't own the sporting rights, the vendors can't delete them. Nor can they say that the sporting rights owners don't intend to exercise them - how would they know what the sporting rights owners' intentions are? All they can say is that the rights owners haven't exercised their sporting rights while the vendors have been in occupation.

The only way the rights can be deleted is with the agreement of the rightsholders. So if the vendors accepted a condition making the sale of the property subject to the deletion of the sporting rights, they'd have to go to the sporting rightsholders and ask them to agree to have their rights deleted. And they don't want to do that in case the rightsholders refuse. The vendors would rather not be in a position where they know the rightsholders have refused to agree to deletion.

I think you have to ask yourself how likely it is that the rightsholders would exercise their rights, and how you would feel about it if they did. If there's no watercourse on the property, you don't have to worry about anyone coming in to exercise fishing rights, and if what you have is a residential property with ancillary garden of the usual size and nature, you really don't have to worry about a fox hunt galloping through your herb garden; that's not what hunts do. The most likely exercise of the sporting rights would be shooting - not in or into your back yard, but on land near your back yard. The rightsowners won't want to forgo their sporting rights over your land in case you then object to shooting on nearby land where they still have rights, claiming that shot is passing through your airspace.