CPO signed before buying a house

Walker63

Hello to all,

I'm here to see if you can help me on this matter. Me and my wife we bought a house in co.Sligo in 11/2018. Had some issue on the house with papers but we did some compromise with previous owner (Double septic tank in our field, ours and the house of the neighbours, weird it's ok). To give some detail of our house it's a little stone cottage, with a 2 meter wide paved passage to the entrance and a little stone wall ( 6 meters long)that does the separation with the road to the main village.

We moved in 12/2018 and last week I send an email to the county council to have information about the new road they were building close our home (that we were aware of it) to see if our house was affected by any road renovation etc etc.... Before buying the house, the only information we had was that the new road would be build 200 meters from our house, so we were ok with that since it was far from it.

The county council road manager called me yesterday to inform me, that actually our front wall and up to 1 meter after that has been sold by CPO (to widen the road) by the previous owner and already received compensation for it. There was no mention of it during the paper work, our sollicitor said to us he did all the research because a piece of the registryland in front of our house we had a doubt, but we thought it was the little piece of grass, and he confirmed that is was owned by the county road, but no mention of upcoming extension or renovation!

What can I do? Is the previous owner in fault for not telling us? or Is it our sollicitor who didn't do enough is job?

Because at the end, we are the ones loosing space, taking all the risk and pertubations of it, and we have no compensation or help for it. If any of you have information on what to do it would help us a lot, cause we are completaly lost.

Thanks in advance for the time and hep

Cheers

(P.S: sorry my english is not perfect I'm from France )

Askthe EA

Id say your solicitor should have referred it to your engineer for comment.

As for the previous owner, well, Caveat Emptor applies I'm afraid.

gk5000

I would check again with you're solicitor - or better check with another solicitor in a different town.

Askthe EA

gk5000 wrote: »

- or better check with another solicitor in a different town.

Indeed.

Walker63

Thanks for you responses,

We have sent the email to our sollicitor and we will have a call with

some people around me thinks it's my sollicitor who didn't do enough research... and I should seek another sollicitor to see if ours didn't do it correctly or not....

Do you really think it's worth it?

We love our house, but it just unfair that we loose land as we never signed anything or warned of anything.

Thanks again for the information, and if you have more, we are still open

gk5000

Walker63 wrote: »

Thanks for you responses,

We have sent the email to our sollicitor and we will have a call with

some people around me thinks it's my sollicitor who didn't do enough research... and I should seek another sollicitor to see if ours didn't do it correctly or not....

Do you really think it's worth it?

We love our house, but it just unfair that we loose land as we never signed anything or warned of anything.

Thanks again for the information, and if you have more, we are still open

Maybe you were warned! See your first post above.

"There was no mention of it during the paper work, our sollicitor said to us he did all the research because a piece of the registryland in front of our house we had a doubt, but we thought it was the little piece of grass, and he confirmed that is was owned by the county road, but no mention of upcoming extension or renovation!"

I would expect the solicitor to inform you what you are buying and what part you do own/not own - but NOT what to expect to happen with land you do not own.

Also the seller cannot sell something he does not own. Check this with your solicitor.

However, I think best see a different solicitor and get a professional opinion - should only cost you say €100 for an initial opinion.

Edit to add: In the country - normally the person who owns the field owns the half of the road - on the registry maps.

the_syco

Walker63 wrote: »

To give some detail of our house it's a little stone cottage, with a 2 meter wide paved passage to the entrance and a little stone wall ( 6 meters long)that does the separation with the road to the main village.

Walker63 wrote: »

The county council road manager called me yesterday to inform me, that actually our front wall and up to 1 meter after that has been sold by CPO (to widen the road) by the previous owner and already received compensation for it.

So the new road would be a meter from your house? You should speak to another solicitor about the deeds of your house, and see if the seller fraudulently sold you land that he did not own.

Don't bother with the current solicitor for now.

dudara

What does the folio for your property show?

Walker63

I can't post photos as I am a new user. If you want to see the bit that was bought by CPO the folio number is <SNIP>

Problem is the part bought by CPO, our sollicitor as done research on it (before the signing) to see who was the owner (he wanted to be sure if it was the council road to take care of )and he confirmed that is was the county council and we should not worry about it.... But he didn't tell us that is was actually our wall and front premice....

Sorry I didn't see you post today , I had our sollicitor on the phone today and we will meet him on monday to discuss on this matter. But he is saying thats it's us who have had to ask and check any road development and he would have investagated on that. He is saying as well that we should chase the previous owner as well....

It's beggining to be chaos ;(

Any ways thanks for the help

antiskeptic

Walker63 wrote: »

I can't post photos as I am a new user. If you want to see the bit that was bought by CPO the folio number is <SNIP>

Problem is the part bought by CPO, our sollicitor as done research on it (before the signing) to see who was the owner (he wanted to be sure if it was the council road to take care of )and he confirmed that is was the county council and we should not worry about it.... But he didn't tell us that is was actually our wall and front premice....

Sorry I didn't see you post today , I had our sollicitor on the phone today and we will meet him on monday to discuss on this matter. But he is saying thats it's us who have had to ask and check any road development and he would have investagated on that. He is saying as well that we should chase the previous owner as well....

It's beggining to be chaos ;(

Any ways thanks for the help

A solicitor does a planning search to see if theres's anything in the immediate vicinity going to affect you.

It may be that councils don't need planning ( they apply to themselves?) But if they do then a road running by your door?

Is he local to the road?

I don't see much point in contacting the vendor - you and your solicitor are the ones to check accuracy of documents.

Reminds me of the chap in the UK who bought a house only to find the council had a demolition order on it. He arrived to find a pile of rubble.

Marcusm

Walker63 wrote: »

I can't post photos as I am a new user. If you want to see the bit that was bought by CPO the folio number is <SNIP>

Problem is the part bought by CPO, our sollicitor as done research on it (before the signing) to see who was the owner (he wanted to be sure if it was the council road to take care of )and he confirmed that is was the county council and we should not worry about it.... But he didn't tell us that is was actually our wall and front premice....

Sorry I didn't see you post today , I had our sollicitor on the phone today and we will meet him on monday to discuss on this matter. But he is saying thats it's us who have had to ask and check any road development and he would have investagated on that. He is saying as well that we should chase the previous owner as well....

It's beggining to be chaos ;(

Any ways thanks for the help

Was the land recently CPO’d such that it should have been apparent that the original folio was split? I would expect a barely competent solicitor (not to kind a good one) to be aware of this from the property searches. If the physical boundary had not been changed prior to completion of the sale I would be annoyed at the estate agent and/or vendor but it is by theur responsibility to point this out.

The solidity should have shown you the folio map andcasked you and/or your surveiyorvyo conform that it agreed to the property you were acquiring.

3DataModem

Walker63 wrote: »

But he is saying thats it's us who have had to ask and check any road development and he would have investagated on that. He is saying as well that we should chase the previous owner as well....

It sounds to me that your solicitor has been misled or has screwed up. Get another one, from a different town, and get them to look into it.

Eric Cartman

at this point it may be worth thinking about what you can get from the council, a nice wall, a nice gate, perhaps the driveway paved, petition them to allow new telecoms lines down to you for better broadband etc...

the_syco

Walker63 wrote: »

I can't post photos as I am a new user. If you want to see the bit that was bought by CPO the folio number is <SNIP>

Nice house.

Not explaining to you that the front garden, which was probably a selling point as it means the house is away from the road, is a royal fcuk up on his part.

Walker63 wrote: »

But he is saying thats it's us who have had to ask and check any road development and he would have investagated on that.

Walker63 wrote: »

our sollicitor said to us he did all the research

He says he did all the research, but missed the part about the garden doing a disappearing act? Especially as the garden paved for use for a car, which you'd get to from the front door. He fcuked up good.

Check with another solicitor, and check how obvious an error the first solictor made, tbh.

=-=

Also, perhaps look into swapping the front door and window, as the positioning of the door will no longer benefit you.

As the front faces west, having a wall or a solid evergreen bush between you and the road will dampen the noise from the road and give you a bit more privacy. It'll also lessen the beams of light entering your house.

the_syco

Also, the house across the road; looks like similar brickwork. From the folio, it looks like it'll loose the front bit of ground that it has.

From the size, I'm guessing it's going from a one road quite boreen, to a road with two lanes. Traffic will increase.

IMO this is the reason that the previous owner left. Your solicitor overlooking this is bad form.

Sleeper12

Walker63 wrote:

What can I do? Is the previous owner in fault for not telling us? or Is it our sollicitor who didn't do enough is job?

It seems very strange to me.

If CPO has already gone through then wouldn't this part of the land be owned by the council? Wouldn't this be recorded in the land registry? I'm sure you were charged searchers fees by the solicitor. Forget about the last owner not telling you. I'm sure your solicitor should have spotted this somewhere before the sale went through.

Very, very strange

Graham

Mod Note

OP, I have removed the folio number and other references to your address. Please (and this goes for other posters too) don't post them again.

CIARAN_BOYLE

Walker63 wrote: »

The county council road manager called me yesterday to inform me, that actually our front wall and up to 1 meter after that has been sold by CPO (to widen the road) by the previous owner and already received compensation for it. There was no mention of it during the paper work, our sollicitor said to us he did all the research because a piece of the registryland in front of our house we had a doubt, but we thought it was the little piece of grass, and he confirmed that is was owned by the county road, but no mention of upcoming extension or renovation!

Hello there. I feel the bolded part may be the most important thing.

Your solicitor confirmed that part of your garden was owned by the council road.

He didn't have the to do research to determine what it was being used for or if they were renovating it. That's not his job. His job was to verify if who owned the land. It sounds to me like he gave all the warning he was supposed to and you continued on anyway.

CIARAN_BOYLE

V

CIARAN_BOYLE wrote: »

Hello there. I feel the bolded part may be the most important thing. Op

Your solicitor confirmed that part of your garden was owned by the council road.

He didn't have the to do research to determine what it was being used for or if they were renovating it. That's not his job. His job was to verify if who owned the land. It sounds to me like he gave all the warning he was supposed to and you continued on anyway.

I don’t agree. If he was my solicitor and acting on my behalf (and getting paid by me ) I would have expected more detail and more warning of this issue before I signed the contracts, in fact I’d be furious and consider sueing this solicitor for not doing his job properly !
How experienced a solicitor is he ? If he knew his client was French (OP) and not completely fluent in legal conveyancing jargon he should have made it his business to be very clear that the issue of CPO was understood. Very few buyers would be OK with that !!

JustAThought

I totally agree - apart from the noise,dirt and building works disruption this will completely affect how your new home will look, sound from inside, dust and noise pollution, its aspect and privacy . Not to mention danger for small children. Your solicitor has pulled a fast one on you and a CPO , let alone a big road widening scheme like this would have been well known in the village. It sounds like he was negligent in his responsibilities by not clearly setting out the changes to your intended property to you from what you had presented to you by the estate agent and I would be making a complaint about him/her to the Law Society or whimever now looks after it. I would also be seriously considering pulling out of the sale on the basis of non disclosure and shady trading practices . The houses value will be worth considerably less the minute that road is started or built and God knows what effect all those diggers and drilling will have on the foundations and walls/roof. The dogs on the street know this. And the council will do* all for you as they have already compensated the owner - nor can they do anything with connections or broadband as this is totally different companies who they have zero control or influence over.

Id say withdraw from the sale and make a complaint to the Law Society. Your solicitor did a bad job and was negligent in their responsibilities to you - especially given that you are French (bonjour!) And working in a foreign system and culture and through s second language. Insist the sale is invalid as you did not have full and proper disclosure on rhe status of yhe property & do not pay the fees - estate agents have no proper or meanigful governance so they will be hit by losing their sale. That solicitor is slipshod & should be held accountable. Get onto the Law Society & ask them about making a complaint about a solicitor and his fees.
If you ate so li love with the house you can buy it again for half later -it will be worth about that then. That is If its 100 year old walls and shale foundations can withstand the ten ton trucks and demolition at its door - and having recently spent months watching the cracks appear in a 1930s building while a road was built 50 feet away I well sympathise.

The cliche of the irish estate agent and local solicitor being either related or in cahoots is well known. Something went very wrong with the clear and unambigious information in this sale & you are the victim. Im very sorry it all went so wrong for you and that you were tricked and cheated so badly and let down by your solicitor. I have no faith in estate agents -I bet this was not in their selling brochure nor in the sales catalogue - but trickery and half truths are their way of life -no surprises there sadly.
Get onto the Law Society in Dublin.

SteM

JustAThought wrote: »

I totally agree - apart from the noise,dirt and building works disruption this will completely affect how your new home will look, sound from inside, dust and noise pollution, its aspect and privacy . Not to mention danger for small children. Your solicitor has pulled a fast one on you and a CPO , let alone a big road widening scheme like this would have been well known in the village. It sounds like he was negligent in his responsibilities by not clearly setting out the changes to your intended property to you from what you had presented to you by the estate agent and I would be making a complaint about him/her to the Law Society or whimever now looks after it. I would also be seriously considering pulling out of the sale on the basis of non disclosure and shady trading practices . The houses value will be worth considerably less the minute that road is started or built and God knows what effect all those diggers and drilling will have on the foundations and walls/roof. The dogs on the street know this. And the council will do* all for you as they have already compensated the owner - nor can they do anything with connections or broadband as this is totally different companies who they have zero control or influence over.

Id say withdraw from the sale and make a complaint to the Law Society. Your solicitor did a bad job and was negligent in their responsibilities to you - especially given that you are French (bonjour!) And working in a foreign system and culture and through s second language. Insist the sale is invalid as you did not have full and proper disclosure on rhe status of yhe property & do not pay the fees - estate agents have no proper or meanigful governance so they will be hit by losing their sale. That solicitor is slipshod & should be held accountable. Get onto the Law Society & ask them about making a complaint about a solicitor and his fees.
If you ate so li love with the house you can buy it again for half later -it will be worth about that then. That is If its 100 year old walls and shale foundations can withstand the ten ton trucks and demolition at its door - and having recently spent months watching the cracks appear in a 1930s building while a road was built 50 feet away I well sympathise.

The cliche of the irish estate agent and local solicitor being either related or in cahoots is well known. Something went very wrong with the clear and unambigious information in this sale & you are the victim. Im very sorry it all went so wrong for you and that you were tricked and cheated so badly and let down by your solicitor. I have no faith in estate agents -I bet this was not in their selling brochure nor in the sales catalogue - but trickery and half truths are their way of life -no surprises there sadly.
Get onto the Law Society in Dublin.

How can they withdraw from the sale? They've already moved in.

antiskeptic

To paraphrase my solicitors instruction to me: "have your architect/surveyor check the boundaries as they exist on site to ensure they conform to the land registry map"

Did the OP employ a surveyor whose task it is to establish boundaries match the map (and who would presumably discuss with the vendor how far in from the wall the actual boundary now was)



Presumably the map gave indication regarding the extent of the site being offered for sale - including the existing garden wall now lying outside the boundary. I know they aren't mm accurate but would imagine the original wall was shown outside the sites boundary.

antiskeptic

JustAThought wrote: »

Your solicitor has pulled a fast one on you and a CPO , let alone a big road widening scheme like this would have been well known in the village.

Was the solicitor local? If not he'd have no idea of the road widening

Is looking up the county development plan part of the search work. If not then no awareness of a new road from that angle.

Does a council apply for planning for road widening (presumably not). If not a planning search wont show it

It sounds like he was negligent in his responsibilities by not clearly setting out the changes to your intended property to you from what you had presented to you by the estate agent and I would be making a complaint about him/her to the Law Society or whimever now looks after it.

Its not clear what he did say. The issue of land to the front not belonging was raised.did the solicitors standard bumpf advise surveyor/architect checking out? Mine does

I would also be seriously considering pulling out of the sale on the basis of non disclosure and shady trading practices

If the boundary was properly enough marked I'd imagine theres no rescinding of the sale. If wrongly marked the fraudulent selling a angle.

Has anyone on here seen the land reg map before the folio was snipped? Did it show the original wall outside the site boundary?


-

The question arises as to the extent to which a solicitor need search. By what mechanism would road widening be known and does that mechanism fall with the solicitors remit. By what mechanism would a previous CPO become known and is that in the search remit of the solicitor?

I wouldnt go rushing off to complain before being quite clear on grounds for doing so.

antiskeptic

OP would you pm the folio so I can see how the boundary was marked up.

Were you told by the solicitor to have a surveyor establish the boundary and did you employ a surveyor?

Walker63

Thanks for all the support.

And yes we love a wee house and moved already in.

After re reading all the sollicitor work, it is unfortunatly marked that before buying, the buyers need to carry out a planning search in order to see if there is any road develompent. So our sollicitor is saying this as well and we signed the contract that day. So we can't blaim on him because he did his job, he checked who was the owner of both folio, but not where were they on the map ( I admit the land registry map is precisie enough, we really though it was the road)

The sollicitor is Local, he even worked with other farmers that there land was bought for the construction of the road, so he new that we were close the new road, but not they were extending our (well I think he wasn't aware).

Yes every one in the transaction knew we were French (bonjour bonjour) and my wife American, and it's our first ever buying of a house.

Before buying we followed advice from the auctionneer and sollicitor to bring an engineer to survey the house by it self (since it was a 1900 based cottage, it was compulsory for the bank) not for boundaries, because we never new that is was actually behind the wall, we had confident in our sollicitor that he would know those kind of stuff.

Any ways we will see the sollicitor this monday and update you on what is happening.

Thanks again for all the information but I'm not sure it will go far. And we are just hoping it will not damage our wee house

Walker63

CIARAN_BOYLE wrote: »

Hello there. I feel the bolded part may be the most important thing.

Your solicitor confirmed that part of your garden was owned by the council road.

He didn't have the to do research to determine what it was being used for or if they were renovating it. That's not his job. His job was to verify if who owned the land. It sounds to me like he gave all the warning he was supposed to and you continued on anyway.

He did control who was the owner, because by showing the street view of our house, we showed what we think is was ( piece of grass in front of our wall) but we weren't sure at all, has we were completaly new of the land registry system. he replied that to be extra sure he will checked that if it's the county council who takes care of it..... after confirmation he confirmed that the county was the owner of the road and not to worrie about it because he reckoned it was only the road and we believed him....

Askthe EA

I'm going to hazard a guess that there has been a miscommunication along the line.

antiskeptic

Walker63 wrote: »

Thanks again for all the information but I'm not sure it will go far. And we are just hoping it will not damage our wee house

I wouldn't worry about that too much. It appears they just want to cut out a bit of the corner. It's not motorway their laying.

antiskeptic

Walker63 wrote: »

He did control who was the owner, because by showing the street view of our house, we showed what we think is was ( piece of grass in front of our wall) but we weren't sure at all, has we were completaly new of the land registry system. he replied that to be extra sure he will checked that if it's the county council who takes care of it..... after confirmation he confirmed that the county was the owner of the road and not to worrie about it because he reckoned it was only the road and we believed him....

Any chance you've any of this in writing?

Walker63

antiskeptic wrote: »

Any chance you've any of this in writing?

No unfortunatly, it was all during the appointment....

JustAThought

If your solicitor had done work for other local people and farmers s/he would have been well aware of the road and the impact on the property. It sounds like sharp trading practises and 'foreigner' he should have shown due dilligence and ensured that there was no room for misinterpretation and put it in writing as well as persinally checked the land registry to see who owned the land and ensuring this was clearly communicated to you before s/he presented the contracts to you to sign . Land registry is a legal document -not an engineers or surveyors responsibility. I didnt realise you had moved it - as it were I would still be formly accusing him of sharp & irresponsible trading practices and not showing due dilligence to his client leading to incomplete disclosure of information prior to presenting the contracts for you to sign. It is extremely shoddy work & not in line with his/her position as your legal representative - it lead to you mot knowing what you were buying and signing for a lroperty that was misrepresemted by the estate agent and not clear & lhysically presented in a manner that was deliberately misleading & now is significantly changed and devalued from the price yku were prepared to pay for it. It may now incur damage due to the proximity of major road works also that could impose significant repair costs or structural damage due to its 100 year old character - not to mention the ambient noise & air pollution. Despite what others say with admitted knowledge of the area CPO and works scheduled s/he was lacking in her duties and responsibilities to you and I would be putting in a complaint and claim against them. And not using a local solicitor for that either.