The Land Registry & First Registration

The ultimate aim of the government department of the Land Registry is to have successfully compiled a comprehensive register of all land ownership in England and Wales. The idea is that the Land Registry hold the information on a central public register so that proving ownership of a house or land is as simple as downloading a copy of the register for that particular property.

As of 2002, it has been compulsory to register a property when it is sold, gifted, transferred, mortgaged or where a new lease is granted for more than 7 years. However, around 15% of the land in England and Wales (equating to 2.3 million hectares) is still unregistered meaning that the Land Registry holds no information for that land. When a property is unregistered there is a reliance on the historic title deeds in order to prove ownership.

There are many benefits of registering your property. Title deeds can often go missing, get damaged or destroyed and even forged. Registering the property gives owners more security, providing better protection against fraudulent claims to the property.

Sometimes title deeds can be unclear as to the extent and the boundaries of the property. This is something that can be dealt with and rectified when registering the property meaning that, if you decide the sell the property in the future, any issues that would have arisen would already have been dealt with.

Similarly, if the title deeds were ever lost or destroyed, the process of reconstructing the title can be costly and time consuming.

As the vast majority of land is already registered, buyers often expect to buy a property already registered. The benefit to the buyer is that they will know that they are acquiring a property where the title has already been checked and approved by the Land Registry and there will be no nasty surprises lurking within the deeds.

To encourage people to register their properties, the Land Registry offer a reduced fee for a Voluntary First Registration. The process of registration is often straight-forward and involves handing the title deeds to your solicitor so they can filter out the relevant documents. Those documents are then sent to the Land Registry and condensed into a single register for that property.

If you would like more information on registering your property please do not hesitate to contact Timms on 01283 561531.