Tell the Land Registry if you move house

We as a practice always advise our clients of the importance of keeping the Land Registry updated in the event of any change in correspondence address. When you purchase a property, your ownership of that property is registered at the Land Registry using your contact details at that time.

The likelihood is that in respect of any residential property, your address will be updated at the Land Registry when you move. However if you own business premises, agricultural land or investment property where you do not reside, it is vital that if you change address that you advise the Land Registry of your new contact details.

This has been highlighted recently in a case whereby a client did not keep the Land Registry updated when they moved house and have potentially lost the title to agricultural land that they owned as a result of an application being made by a third party. In such circumstances the Land Registry will write to the last known address of the registered owner to advise them of a claim. However our clients had already moved on and did not receive the very important correspondence from the Land Registry. If they had received it, they would have been in a position to challenge the third party’s claim against their land.

As they did not receive the notification, they now have to go to the expense and the stress of proving to the Land Registry that they did not receive the original correspondence in an attempt to overturn the Land Registry’s decision.

All applications made by third parties via the Land Registry will be notified to the registered proprietor by the Land Registry. However if your address is not up to date, then the Land Registry will not go any further than simply writing to your last known address.

Therefore, if you have moved house or are moving house, contact the Land Registry and advise them of any title numbers of which you are the registered proprietor so that the Land Registry can (free of charge) update their records. However if you would like to instruct us to do this on your behalf, please contact us and we will be happy to assist on (01267) 237441 or www.utk.co.uk