£10k BILL IS THIS FRAUD
Discussion
blueg33 said:
You cant really hide a charge, I guess you can forget to register it
ok if you can't hide a charge why did it not show up on any of the searches performed by us the sellers solicitor and the halifax who we had our mortgage with ?, also from memory when we purchased i can remember my solicitor mentioning that he had (which we paid for) some kind of deeper/extra search done as it he deemed it nesasary as previously there had been lots of parcels of land sold off and local farmers renting differing parcels of land.
i,m still using the solicitor in question and i have for years used the same solicitor to purchase various plots of land and never had the slightest hint of a problem, yes i do agree he should have pursued the charge being cleared 3 years ago and perhaps foolish of myself to believe that when i received conformation that the original sellers had agreed to clear the charge, i have agreed that my solicitor holds back £10k to clear the charge if the council hold out that it needs to be repaid to release the property free to complete, going back to the early days of this thread the original seller signed documents to say there were no financial ties or the equivalent to this property i have the original documents filed away and in a legal way the question is asked IMO more than once, and they lied on the answers to these questions, They also after being contacted by the council and agreeing to pay decided not to and are now agreeing to pay when they have sold some property, believe me they are not short of funds the family at one time owned a vast amount of land and property and still do own valuable property, again going back to the 3rd page of this thread EW109 posted with some very good advice about the charge being unlawful and it is hopefully now looking like this is coming to fruition, its annoying if it goes this route as i save £10k but so do the scumbags who IMO have committed Fraud and a loophole has allowed them to get away with it.....
Guys, I do apologise for not adding this sooner but all of your help and time is very very much appreciated. I,m trying to digest all the advice along with packing up to move, Organising my early retirement, Dealing with a health problem and relocating abroad which is all happening this week,
Geeze i,m tired......
Geeze i,m tired......
Pro Bono said:
The basic situation seems to be that Wyre Forest District Council made a grant of £10,000 to the previous owners of the property to help them carry out flood defence work.
This grant was made in accordance with the Council's Private Sector Housing Assistance Policy 2006. Paragraph 16 of the Policy reads as follows:
16. REPAYMENT ON CHANGE OF OWNERSHIP
16.1 Decent Home Assistance, but not Disabled Facilities Grants, will be repayable on demand, on disposal of the property or part of it, in accordance with the provision of Sections 44 to 55 of the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996. The financial assistance provided will be registered as a local charge on the property.
Basically, therefore, the £10,000 was repayable to the Council on the sale of the property. In order to protect itself the Council would – or should – have registered the liability as a local land charge in the Local Land Charges Register ("LLCR").
This has nothing to do with the Land Registry, and there would therefore be no mention of a local land charge in the Land Registry entries.
When a solicitor is acting in the purchase of a property it's standard practice to make a local search. This is a formal enquiry sent to the local authority and includes a request for a search of the LLCR. Assuming the charge had been properly registered by the Council then a formal search would have revealed this and the solicitor would have treated it in the same way as if there had been a mortgage registered against the property, i.e. he would have requested an undertaking from the seller's solicitor that the charge would be repaid in full on completion of the sale.
Quite clearly, this did not happen, and there are several possible reasons why.
The first is that the local authority forgot to register the land charge in the LLCR. If so, they cannot claim repayment from turbo, though they can still reclaim payment from the seller. This seems very unlikely in the light of the letter from the Council.
It seems from turbo's original comments and from the Council’s letter that his solicitor did not submit a formal search to the Council, but instead employed a “search agent“ to carry out a personal search.
This has been common practice for many years, and the personal search industry arose as a result of very long delays by councils in processing searches.
Personal searches must always include an inspection of the LLCR and the search agent must report any entries. However, mistakes do happen, and it’s possible that the search agent in this case didn’t notice the land charge. If so, they would almost certainly be liable in negligence to turbo for financial loss sustained as a result.
Surprisingly, I actually think this may be the most likely answer. The reason I say this is that in the original letter from the Council to turbo they say,
“... when the property was being considered for purchase by yourselves a personal search company was employed. They did not pay for or request details of what outstanding debts were applicable under the above legislation.”
Unfortunately, the letter’s chopped off, so we don’t know what “the above legislation” is, but it’s probably the 1996 Act. But the key point is that there would have been a fee payable to inspect the LLCR - £25.50 at present in Wyre Forest – and it seems clear that the search agent didn’t pay the fee, perhaps to save money.
If they didn’t pay the fee then they can’t have inspected the LLCR, in which case the charge wouldn’t have shown up on the local search.
If this is what happened, then it’s a pretty clear case of negligence on the part of the search agent. They would presumably carry PI insurance, so it should have been a straightforward claim against them.
This aspect of the matter should be fairly easy to resolve. All turbo needs to do is to obtain a copy of the search carried out when he bought the property. This will clarify whether or not the land charge was disclosed in the search.
What concerns me, however, is that this is a question which his solicitor must have looked into immediately the land charge was discovered. He must, therefore, know exactly what the situation is, and I can’t understand why turbo has been left so completely in the dark. The lack of information raises a suspicion that the solicitor is hiding something.
It may be, for example, that he failed to notice that the search didn’t include a search of the LLC, or perhaps the search agent’s gone bust and didn’t carry any PI insurance. In either case the solicitor himself may well be liable to turbo, and it may be that he’s concealing this, in the hope he can resolve it without turbo ever finding out and making a claim against him.
In the short term the retention solution will work, but turbo needs to ask his solicitor to give him a full written report regarding the matter. If the solicitor has been in the wrong he can’t very well continue to conceal that in the context of such a report. If he hasn’t, then at least turbo will have a proper explanation.
Finally, turbo would also probably have a good claim against the seller, as the seller was under a legal duty to disclose the existence of this debt, even if it hadn’t been registered in the LLCR. The relevant case is Rignall Developments Ltd –v- Halil [1987] 3 WLR 394.
Whatever the outcome, turbo should not be left out of pocket, but I hope he comes back and tells us what really happened, as it’s a fascinating detective story!
Thank you for the advice,This grant was made in accordance with the Council's Private Sector Housing Assistance Policy 2006. Paragraph 16 of the Policy reads as follows:
16. REPAYMENT ON CHANGE OF OWNERSHIP
16.1 Decent Home Assistance, but not Disabled Facilities Grants, will be repayable on demand, on disposal of the property or part of it, in accordance with the provision of Sections 44 to 55 of the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996. The financial assistance provided will be registered as a local charge on the property.
Basically, therefore, the £10,000 was repayable to the Council on the sale of the property. In order to protect itself the Council would – or should – have registered the liability as a local land charge in the Local Land Charges Register ("LLCR").
This has nothing to do with the Land Registry, and there would therefore be no mention of a local land charge in the Land Registry entries.
When a solicitor is acting in the purchase of a property it's standard practice to make a local search. This is a formal enquiry sent to the local authority and includes a request for a search of the LLCR. Assuming the charge had been properly registered by the Council then a formal search would have revealed this and the solicitor would have treated it in the same way as if there had been a mortgage registered against the property, i.e. he would have requested an undertaking from the seller's solicitor that the charge would be repaid in full on completion of the sale.
Quite clearly, this did not happen, and there are several possible reasons why.
The first is that the local authority forgot to register the land charge in the LLCR. If so, they cannot claim repayment from turbo, though they can still reclaim payment from the seller. This seems very unlikely in the light of the letter from the Council.
It seems from turbo's original comments and from the Council’s letter that his solicitor did not submit a formal search to the Council, but instead employed a “search agent“ to carry out a personal search.
This has been common practice for many years, and the personal search industry arose as a result of very long delays by councils in processing searches.
Personal searches must always include an inspection of the LLCR and the search agent must report any entries. However, mistakes do happen, and it’s possible that the search agent in this case didn’t notice the land charge. If so, they would almost certainly be liable in negligence to turbo for financial loss sustained as a result.
Surprisingly, I actually think this may be the most likely answer. The reason I say this is that in the original letter from the Council to turbo they say,
“... when the property was being considered for purchase by yourselves a personal search company was employed. They did not pay for or request details of what outstanding debts were applicable under the above legislation.”
Unfortunately, the letter’s chopped off, so we don’t know what “the above legislation” is, but it’s probably the 1996 Act. But the key point is that there would have been a fee payable to inspect the LLCR - £25.50 at present in Wyre Forest – and it seems clear that the search agent didn’t pay the fee, perhaps to save money.
If they didn’t pay the fee then they can’t have inspected the LLCR, in which case the charge wouldn’t have shown up on the local search.
If this is what happened, then it’s a pretty clear case of negligence on the part of the search agent. They would presumably carry PI insurance, so it should have been a straightforward claim against them.
This aspect of the matter should be fairly easy to resolve. All turbo needs to do is to obtain a copy of the search carried out when he bought the property. This will clarify whether or not the land charge was disclosed in the search.
What concerns me, however, is that this is a question which his solicitor must have looked into immediately the land charge was discovered. He must, therefore, know exactly what the situation is, and I can’t understand why turbo has been left so completely in the dark. The lack of information raises a suspicion that the solicitor is hiding something.
It may be, for example, that he failed to notice that the search didn’t include a search of the LLC, or perhaps the search agent’s gone bust and didn’t carry any PI insurance. In either case the solicitor himself may well be liable to turbo, and it may be that he’s concealing this, in the hope he can resolve it without turbo ever finding out and making a claim against him.
In the short term the retention solution will work, but turbo needs to ask his solicitor to give him a full written report regarding the matter. If the solicitor has been in the wrong he can’t very well continue to conceal that in the context of such a report. If he hasn’t, then at least turbo will have a proper explanation.
Finally, turbo would also probably have a good claim against the seller, as the seller was under a legal duty to disclose the existence of this debt, even if it hadn’t been registered in the LLCR. The relevant case is Rignall Developments Ltd –v- Halil [1987] 3 WLR 394.
Whatever the outcome, turbo should not be left out of pocket, but I hope he comes back and tells us what really happened, as it’s a fascinating detective story!
As i still have all the original paperwork i have looked back through it and my solicitor charged me for following in 2017,
ALL NECASARY SEARCHES AND ENQUIRIES ,
CHECKING SELLERS HAVE GOOD TITLE,
I presume this would include the LLCR search but it very much looks like it didn't and at this moment the sale is going ahead,
I,m awaiting correspondence/advice from my solicitor as to which way this will go,
Thanks
Breadvan72 said:
It appears that your solicitor may have a conflict of interest, as he or she, or an agent retained by him or her, may possibly have made a negligent error. A lawyer who becomes aware of this is supposed to inform the client and recommend that the client seeks independent advice (and at the same time notify the lawyer's professional indemnity insurer of a possible claim). I think that it might be a good idea to talk to another lawyer soon.
Thanks BV,I will take your advice,
Never having done anything like this before but in yours or anyones opinion would i be in a position to cover costs in recovering the £10k or will i end up paying £9999.00 to recover £10k ?,
Hi everyone,
A update to what’s happened so far, The house sale went through and we had to part with the £10k to the council to lift the charge and let the sale proceed, We are now living in sunny Spain and with plenty of time on my hands i dug out all the old relevant paperwork/correspondence and found a old email with a link attached from my solicitor this link had original search report and to my surprise the charge on the property was uncovered back in 2017, My solicitor failed to recognise or act on it or bring it to our attention, Also when it first came to light the council who had been in touch with the previous owners and made a agreement with them to pay it back failed to collect the debt from them, So fast forward onto where we are today i have made a complaint to my solicitor through there complaints procedure and i have just heard back that they are accepting no liability at present but have referred it to there indemnity insurance company, So this is our first step in the right direction i have also written to the council and asked why they had never recovered the debt from the previous owner along with a few other questions and they are now referring it there legal department,
So at last its looking like i may get to the bottom of all this and recover my hard earned £10k......
A update to what’s happened so far, The house sale went through and we had to part with the £10k to the council to lift the charge and let the sale proceed, We are now living in sunny Spain and with plenty of time on my hands i dug out all the old relevant paperwork/correspondence and found a old email with a link attached from my solicitor this link had original search report and to my surprise the charge on the property was uncovered back in 2017, My solicitor failed to recognise or act on it or bring it to our attention, Also when it first came to light the council who had been in touch with the previous owners and made a agreement with them to pay it back failed to collect the debt from them, So fast forward onto where we are today i have made a complaint to my solicitor through there complaints procedure and i have just heard back that they are accepting no liability at present but have referred it to there indemnity insurance company, So this is our first step in the right direction i have also written to the council and asked why they had never recovered the debt from the previous owner along with a few other questions and they are now referring it there legal department,
So at last its looking like i may get to the bottom of all this and recover my hard earned £10k......
Hi,
Back in 2017 i received a email from my solicitor which he copied in a response from the council stating they had been in touch with the previous owners who had agreed to repay the grant/debt,
Hence why back then I believed it to be sorted,
Back in 2017 i received a email from my solicitor which he copied in a response from the council stating they had been in touch with the previous owners who had agreed to repay the grant/debt,
Hence why back then I believed it to be sorted,
kestral said:
Back in 2017 22 November you posted this:
Quote: "Thanks for everyones input and advice concerning this problem it is now sorted where the previous owners have picked up the bill" :End Quote.
Please can you explain what occured for that to happen and for you to believe that the debt was not your responsibility anymore?
Who told you or who said the responsibilty for the debt laid at the door of the vendors?
Quote: "Thanks for everyones input and advice concerning this problem it is now sorted where the previous owners have picked up the bill" :End Quote.
Please can you explain what occured for that to happen and for you to believe that the debt was not your responsibility anymore?
Who told you or who said the responsibilty for the debt laid at the door of the vendors?
Hi,
Thought a good time for a update sorry its been a few months but i,m still £10k out of pocket,
The reply from the solicitor was basically yes we have f*****d up and we’re really really sorry and we can refer it back to our insurers who i would like to think would have to pay out or could we act for you and go after the previous owners (Free of charge) who have been deliberately unscrupulous about the grant and debt, So after a good think we decided to go after the previous owners who are still lying and trying to worm there way out of paying us the £10k back,
Our solicitor called it something like owing the debt to us under subrogation and they were legally liable for the debt, So over the last few months they have replied various times saying they can’t afford to repay the money as there business has shut down (public house & restaurant) so they have no income a quick google on this and its untrue there still trading doing takeaway meals etc, Our solicitor has done plenty of digging and there property is registered in there parents name, We have also asked where the £600k funds are we paid for the property but they declined to answer this one, However they have just offered to pay us back on a monthly basis (through there solicitor) which we have declined so we are just about to issue proceedings to recover the debt,
I have also been bouncing emails back and forth with the council which is escalating asking awkward questions as to why they were allowed to walk away from paying back public funds when it clearly states on the agreement they were to pay it back upon sale of the property and they also later made a agreement to pay the debt of monthly, It was basically one persons decision who decided on letting them get away with it so i also asked the question has he a personal connection with the original sellers and i was told no but thats appearing to be untrue, The council are contradicting them self’s with some of there answers which i,m awaiting explanation of,
So i,m still at it but it feels like its coming to a end.....
Ps forgot to add at the start that if we don’t win our case with previous owners the solicitor will still refer it back to there insurance company.
Thought a good time for a update sorry its been a few months but i,m still £10k out of pocket,
The reply from the solicitor was basically yes we have f*****d up and we’re really really sorry and we can refer it back to our insurers who i would like to think would have to pay out or could we act for you and go after the previous owners (Free of charge) who have been deliberately unscrupulous about the grant and debt, So after a good think we decided to go after the previous owners who are still lying and trying to worm there way out of paying us the £10k back,
Our solicitor called it something like owing the debt to us under subrogation and they were legally liable for the debt, So over the last few months they have replied various times saying they can’t afford to repay the money as there business has shut down (public house & restaurant) so they have no income a quick google on this and its untrue there still trading doing takeaway meals etc, Our solicitor has done plenty of digging and there property is registered in there parents name, We have also asked where the £600k funds are we paid for the property but they declined to answer this one, However they have just offered to pay us back on a monthly basis (through there solicitor) which we have declined so we are just about to issue proceedings to recover the debt,
I have also been bouncing emails back and forth with the council which is escalating asking awkward questions as to why they were allowed to walk away from paying back public funds when it clearly states on the agreement they were to pay it back upon sale of the property and they also later made a agreement to pay the debt of monthly, It was basically one persons decision who decided on letting them get away with it so i also asked the question has he a personal connection with the original sellers and i was told no but thats appearing to be untrue, The council are contradicting them self’s with some of there answers which i,m awaiting explanation of,
So i,m still at it but it feels like its coming to a end.....
Ps forgot to add at the start that if we don’t win our case with previous owners the solicitor will still refer it back to there insurance company.
Edited by turbo9111 on Tuesday 9th February 11:56
roadsmash said:
Yes, this is a bizarre decision from you OP. It’s like you want to see the previous owners pay for their behaviour and get a kick from it.
People like that never lose, they will never pay. Bailiffs will turn up and surprise surprise nothing will be owned by them, it will be their friends, or their family’s assets, or it will all be on finance etc.
Claim on the insurance and don’t look back.
Your dead right i want them to suffer and yes i will get a kick from it without going into detail they are awful people who stitched us up in many waysPeople like that never lose, they will never pay. Bailiffs will turn up and surprise surprise nothing will be owned by them, it will be their friends, or their family’s assets, or it will all be on finance etc.
Claim on the insurance and don’t look back.
sospan said:
OP, having gone through the topic I see it as, eventually your solicitor failed in not doing due diligence in finding the charge for whatever reason. Add to this the behaviour of the sellers in not declaring the charge clearly and evasive actions since.
YOU are owed £10k.
The solicitors are trying to deal direct with the sellers who are likely to be as evasive and non cooperative as in the past. Their alternative is to let their insurers settle with you and then they pursue the sellers for £10k.
Your solicitor is asking you a favour and wait even longer for £10k after THEIR error. In the meantime you remain £10k out of pocket.
At the very least it would be worth giving them a firm date to recover and pass on to you the full sum plus costs/compensation/ goodwill gesture.
If this date passes then insist on insurers settling quickly.
Your solicitors may be trying to avoid the insurer route so as to keep their record clean and prevent premium increases, mitigating cost to them? If that is how it works.
I hope that seems reasonable from a procedural process point of view.
Thanks i take your comments as something to think about ,,YOU are owed £10k.
The solicitors are trying to deal direct with the sellers who are likely to be as evasive and non cooperative as in the past. Their alternative is to let their insurers settle with you and then they pursue the sellers for £10k.
Your solicitor is asking you a favour and wait even longer for £10k after THEIR error. In the meantime you remain £10k out of pocket.
At the very least it would be worth giving them a firm date to recover and pass on to you the full sum plus costs/compensation/ goodwill gesture.
If this date passes then insist on insurers settling quickly.
Your solicitors may be trying to avoid the insurer route so as to keep their record clean and prevent premium increases, mitigating cost to them? If that is how it works.
I hope that seems reasonable from a procedural process point of view.
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