house deeds

[blobby02uk]

My Mother-in-Law has recently accidentally thrown away her house deeds!

Does anyone know what she must do? Do we visit a solicitor, or the local council, or the building society? She has no mortgage on the property. Please help as she is really upset!

Thanks in anticipation, blobby02uk

[snook]

We went through the process recently of verifying this for my mother-in-law who was also very concerned (her mortgage was paid up but she had no deeds to prove it).

Searching for information on deeds I found that the deeds have no legal value anymore. You need to contact the building society or local council and explain that you need a copy of the registration with the Land Registry. That's all you actually need. The reason the deeds no longer have any intrinsic value is that (as I understand it) all the important information in them was transferred to electronic form (i.e., the details are now stored on computer).

If there's any change in ownership, the Land Registry has to be informed so that the entry in the Register can be updated.

I hope this helps, as I know it can be worrying if the deeds have been accidentally lost/destroyed. But speak to the mortgage lender and verify what I've said - I think you'll find that it's right and that you only need a copy of the registration for the property.

[dilligaf]

Contact HM Land Registry Office. This will have to be done by the owner of the property.
They will issue a copy of the Registry document giving the name of the person and the property that is registered to them.
Deeds no longer need to be kept apart from historic or sentimental value. Certainly will not affect the sale of her house.

[buildersmate]

I may yet be corrected, but I believe the above is only true if the land is registered with HM Land Registry. Land registration has been around in England and Wales since 1925 but only half of land is registered. About five years ago LR made registration compulsory at date of the next transfer but this may take a generation to work through. If your land is not registered, the old-fashioned conveyance document still is used to verify who owns the land. Apply anyway to the LR to see if it is registered, in which case the above scenarios are valid.

[blobby02uk]

http://www.landregisteronline.gov.uk/lro/index.html

Thank you so much everyone for replying! I have managed to find her house is registered at the above site, so I guess she will be fine! I will pay the �2 or whatever, so she will have a copy of some sorts.

Having said that, on searching for my fathers address, it doesn't seem to be registered, so that's another problem, eh??!!

blobby02uk xxxx

[Hgrove]

Agree with all of the above, however, only a property that has not changed hands since "before" 1925 will be unregistered - unless there was a negligent solicitor involved somewhere along the line - but it is very, very unlikely.