Deeds and history
Discussion
The house that I grew up in is on the market, and it reminded me that some time in the past, possibly when it we sold it in 1988, I'm sure I saw a folder of paperwork aka The Deeds with lots of history going back to the 1940s.
The current owner tells me you can get a copy from Land Registry, but it seems like that's only current information, not historical. I have a nasty feeling all the history has been disposed of by some bank of building society to make space, but is there any way I can find out one way or the other?
The current owner tells me you can get a copy from Land Registry, but it seems like that's only current information, not historical. I have a nasty feeling all the history has been disposed of by some bank of building society to make space, but is there any way I can find out one way or the other?
We got a pack of documents going back to the 30s with our 1935 build house.
Original documents with stamp duty (with stamps) and lovely calligraphy with legal jargon. The plans for the development of the site and all boundaries. Then info on the 1st private owner, his "assent" as records show he died in our house, then being able to trace the transfer of ownership to his son, then his son's sister, then out of the family in 1998.
It's a lovely walk through 90 years of history. Sad to think many would be destroyed.
Original documents with stamp duty (with stamps) and lovely calligraphy with legal jargon. The plans for the development of the site and all boundaries. Then info on the 1st private owner, his "assent" as records show he died in our house, then being able to trace the transfer of ownership to his son, then his son's sister, then out of the family in 1998.
It's a lovely walk through 90 years of history. Sad to think many would be destroyed.
We have deeds going back to when the house was built in 1912, we're only the third family to live here.
Only because I asked the solicitor to keep them though.
When dad died and we sold the house my brother just sent everything on to the solicitor, I now wish I'd photocopied some of the stuff included, he'd had a detached garage built in the 50s, proper quality Yorkshire stone and York stone roof slates for £400,
I know it all relative to the time, but when I asked our solicitor what happened to it all, 'through the shredder, it's all digital nowadays' was the answer.
Only because I asked the solicitor to keep them though.
When dad died and we sold the house my brother just sent everything on to the solicitor, I now wish I'd photocopied some of the stuff included, he'd had a detached garage built in the 50s, proper quality Yorkshire stone and York stone roof slates for £400,
I know it all relative to the time, but when I asked our solicitor what happened to it all, 'through the shredder, it's all digital nowadays' was the answer.
Simpo Two said:
possibly when it we sold it in 1988, I'm sure I saw a folder of paperwork aka The Deeds with lots of history going back to the 1940s.
The Land Registry keeps (almost) everything electronically. The Register only shows and they only keep things that are still relevant, such as ongoing covenants.Depending where the house is located there will first have been "voluntary registration of Title" and later "compulsory registration of Title". Compulsory simply means it must be registered the next time it changes hands. That might have been 1988 in which case your solicitor will almost certainly have passed ALL the Deeds and documents over to the buyer's solicitor. There will also have been an Epitome of Title - a chronological list of all the relevant title documents relating to the unregistered land. Its purpose is to prove the current owner's legal right to sell or otherwise deal with the property. The buyer's solicitor will then have sent to the Land Registry such Deeds and documents as were relevant and filed/destroyed the rest.
For what it's worth you can ask the Land Registry about the history of a property's registered ownership using form HC1.
Panamax said:
Depending where the house is located there will first have been "voluntary registration of Title" and later "compulsory registration of Title". Compulsory simply means it must be registered the next time it changes hands. That might have been 1988 in which case your solicitor will almost certainly have passed ALL the Deeds and documents over to the buyer's solicitor. There will also have been an Epitome of Title - a chronological list of all the relevant title documents relating to the unregistered land. Its purpose is to prove the current owner's legal right to sell or otherwise deal with the property. The buyer's solicitor will then have sent to the Land Registry such Deeds and documents as were relevant and filed/destroyed the rest.
For what it's worth you can ask the Land Registry about the history of a property's registered ownership using form HC1.
Thanks very much. The current owner is the daughter of the people who bought it in 1988; she called the bank who advised that the bank stopped holding the deeds in 2007 and sent them to Land Registry. Whether that's a general one-size-fits-all answer or an a specific one I don't know.For what it's worth you can ask the Land Registry about the history of a property's registered ownership using form HC1.
So if I send my £7 to LR is that all I can do and they'll just send me what they have?
Simpo Two said:
So if I send my £7 to LR is that all I can do and they'll just send me what they have?
£7 will get you the registered title, and a further £7 will get you the plan.On the registered title you may find in italics after an entry 'copy filed' - you can order those documents for a further £7 each. No idea how you do it as a non-business user; we have a portal which makes it easy to identify what you want to order.
Chances are any additional documents are only a very limited subset of the original paper title deeds. If there are no old covenants or rights which refer back to old deeds, they wouldn't appear on the register. They aren't automatically retained to show the chain of ownership, for instance - all the Land Registry try to do is record the current owner at the time a property is registered and onwards.
Mortgage lenders don't generally send old deeds to the Land Registry; they send them to the borrower or their solicitor. So they may still be held in folder somewhere. Good luck finding them.
If your deeds disappeared 50 years ago it could be that Messrs Scott and Young were responsible,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsjdjWGDvFkin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsjdjWGDvFkin
Simpo Two said:
The house that I grew up in is on the market, and it reminded me that some time in the past, possibly when it we sold it in 1988, I'm sure I saw a folder of paperwork aka The Deeds with lots of history going back to the 1940s.
The current owner tells me you can get a copy from Land Registry, but it seems like that's only current information, not historical. I have a nasty feeling all the history has been disposed of by some bank of building society to make space, but is there any way I can find out one way or the other?
Several years ago. my bank sent me a letter saying they would be sending me all the paperwork they had for my house, saying something like "We are no longer required to hold all this stuff as everything is held electronically now at The Land Registry". They also said that they would be sent in the normal post as the papers had no value anymore.The current owner tells me you can get a copy from Land Registry, but it seems like that's only current information, not historical. I have a nasty feeling all the history has been disposed of by some bank of building society to make space, but is there any way I can find out one way or the other?
And indeed, a big pile of paperwork (2 or 3 inches thick maybe), with all the old field maps, deeds, allsorts of stuff, turned up. God knows how much space they needed to keep all of those?
I bought a house in 99 and the solicitor asked if I wanted the deeds or should he dispose of them as no longer needed. I kept them, dating back to 1934, showing when it was all fields on big tracing paper maps and the original conveyance, together with subsequent conveyances and associated paperwork, all in lovely copperplate writing. I left those with the house when we moved and got similar with the current house, built in 1964, as the previous owners had been here a long time. Both houses had been built by the same building firm, who are still around today! The first house was originally sold, by the looks of it, to a family member of the builder - my suspicion is that even then, creative accounting existed! 
They're an interesting slice of history, which you won't get nowadays.
They're an interesting slice of history, which you won't get nowadays.
Jobbo said:
£7 will get you the registered title, and a further £7 will get you the plan.
On the registered title you may find in italics after an entry 'copy filed' - you can order those documents for a further £7 each. No idea how you do it as a non-business user; we have a portal which makes it easy to identify what you want to order.
Chances are any additional documents are only a very limited subset of the original paper title deeds. If there are no old covenants or rights which refer back to old deeds, they wouldn't appear on the register. They aren't automatically retained to show the chain of ownership, for instance - all the Land Registry try to do is record the current owner at the time a property is registered and onwards.
Mortgage lenders don't generally send old deeds to the Land Registry; they send them to the borrower or their solicitor. So they may still be held in folder somewhere. Good luck finding them.
So, if I go to https://www.gov.uk/get-information-about-property-... and pay 2x £7 they'll tell me who owns it and what the plans are. But I already know all that. Or is it worth doing just in case something shows up? Would there be an Epitome of Title that Panamax mentioned?On the registered title you may find in italics after an entry 'copy filed' - you can order those documents for a further £7 each. No idea how you do it as a non-business user; we have a portal which makes it easy to identify what you want to order.
Chances are any additional documents are only a very limited subset of the original paper title deeds. If there are no old covenants or rights which refer back to old deeds, they wouldn't appear on the register. They aren't automatically retained to show the chain of ownership, for instance - all the Land Registry try to do is record the current owner at the time a property is registered and onwards.
Mortgage lenders don't generally send old deeds to the Land Registry; they send them to the borrower or their solicitor. So they may still be held in folder somewhere. Good luck finding them.
snuffy said:
Several years ago. my bank sent me a letter saying they would be sending me all the paperwork they had for my house, saying something like "We are no longer required to hold all this stuff as everything is held electronically now at The Land Registry". They also said that they would be sent in the normal post as the papers had no value anymore.
And indeed, a big pile of paperwork (2 or 3 inches thick maybe), with all the old field maps, deeds, allsorts of stuff, turned up. God knows how much space they needed to keep all of those?
Yes, that's what I got from the building society when I paid off my mortgage about 10 years ago.And indeed, a big pile of paperwork (2 or 3 inches thick maybe), with all the old field maps, deeds, allsorts of stuff, turned up. God knows how much space they needed to keep all of those?
In the case of the old house, when the current owner says the bank sent them to the LR in 2007 could she be mistaken, or maybe she asked the wrong question?
Simpo Two said:
Jobbo said:
£7 will get you the registered title, and a further £7 will get you the plan.
On the registered title you may find in italics after an entry 'copy filed' - you can order those documents for a further £7 each. No idea how you do it as a non-business user; we have a portal which makes it easy to identify what you want to order.
Chances are any additional documents are only a very limited subset of the original paper title deeds. If there are no old covenants or rights which refer back to old deeds, they wouldn't appear on the register. They aren't automatically retained to show the chain of ownership, for instance - all the Land Registry try to do is record the current owner at the time a property is registered and onwards.
Mortgage lenders don't generally send old deeds to the Land Registry; they send them to the borrower or their solicitor. So they may still be held in folder somewhere. Good luck finding them.
So, if I go to https://www.gov.uk/get-information-about-property-... and pay 2x £7 they'll tell me who owns it and what the plans are. But I already know all that. Or is it worth doing just in case something shows up? Would there be an Epitome of Title that Panamax mentioned?On the registered title you may find in italics after an entry 'copy filed' - you can order those documents for a further £7 each. No idea how you do it as a non-business user; we have a portal which makes it easy to identify what you want to order.
Chances are any additional documents are only a very limited subset of the original paper title deeds. If there are no old covenants or rights which refer back to old deeds, they wouldn't appear on the register. They aren't automatically retained to show the chain of ownership, for instance - all the Land Registry try to do is record the current owner at the time a property is registered and onwards.
Mortgage lenders don't generally send old deeds to the Land Registry; they send them to the borrower or their solicitor. So they may still be held in folder somewhere. Good luck finding them.
Jobbo said:
Simpo Two said:
How would I get the title number? Can you provide a link or possibly for a virtual beer I could PM you the details?
Go to the Land Registry site and do a Map Search. Mine's a Boddingtons....https://search-property-information.service.gov.uk...
Simpo Two said:
That would be ideal. How would I get the title number? Can you provide a link or possibly for a virtual beer I could PM you the details?
Look up the property and it should give you the title number before you have to pay anything. Edit: I’ve just tried and there’s a link once you have typed the address to ‘Available Documents’. You need to create an account to go further so I had to stop there.
Edited by Jobbo on Tuesday 11th November 21:24
Jobbo said:
Look up the property and it should give you the title number before you have to pay anything.
Edit: I ve just tried and there s a link once you have typed the address to Available Documents . You need to create an account to go further so I had to stop there.
I created an account and paid £14 and now have a PDF containing the Title Number and the Title Register, which contains the Property Register, Proprietorship Register and Charges Register. Nothing before the last sale in 1988.Edit: I ve just tried and there s a link once you have typed the address to Available Documents . You need to create an account to go further so I had to stop there.
How do I get from Title Number to Epitome of Title or see if there's anything else?
I found trying to get details from LR going back any meaningful time was virtually impossible not helped by that fact our house has undergone multiple names since it was first built about 400 years ago.
When the mortgage was paid off around 15 years ago I got copies of all the deeds they had on file and after further enquires got some paper's going back a few more years but prior to the 60's virtually nothing else.
Would love to know if there is anything else out there but don't think there is -National archives didn't seem very promising a search either.
When the mortgage was paid off around 15 years ago I got copies of all the deeds they had on file and after further enquires got some paper's going back a few more years but prior to the 60's virtually nothing else.
Would love to know if there is anything else out there but don't think there is -National archives didn't seem very promising a search either.
Simpo Two said:
I created an account and paid £14 and now have a PDF containing the Title Number and the Title Register, which contains the Property Register, Proprietorship Register and Charges Register. Nothing before the last sale in 1988.
How do I get from Title Number to Epitome of Title or see if there's anything else?
An epitome of title is something produced by a solicitor for a seller of unregistered property, to give to the solicitor for a buyer of that property. It does not go to the Land Registry and you'll never be able to get it.How do I get from Title Number to Epitome of Title or see if there's anything else?
Have a look on the title for any references to conveyances or deeds or indentures (it will set out who the parties were and the date of the document) and below that entry, if available from the Land Registry it will show 'copy filed' in italics - or maybe 'copy plan filed' or 'copy filed under title number XX0000' or similar. Those are the documents which can be downloaded from the Land Registry. I'll quote from my first post on this thread:
"Chances are any additional documents are only a very limited subset of the original paper title deeds. If there are no old covenants or rights which refer back to old deeds, they wouldn't appear on the register. They aren't automatically retained to show the chain of ownership, for instance - all the Land Registry try to do is record the current owner at the time a property is registered and onwards."
I don't think it's ever going to be possible to get what you want from the Land Registry unfortunately.
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