Chancel repair liability (very off topic!)

SimpleSimon

Well-Known Member
Mrs Simplesimon and I are currently going through the long and eye-wateringly expensive journey of buying our first property having been renting for the last 5 years.

Today I received a letter from our solicitor informing me of the risk of Chancel Repair Liability. This is something I'd never previously heard of, and now that I have heard of it I struggle to comprehend how in the hell it's still law. Apparently, if you own property on land that once belonged to the church (according to maps from around or before the time of Henry VIII) then you're automatically liable for a potentially unlimited sum of money, on an unlimited number of occasions, to fund repairs to the chancel of said church.

What century is this?!

Even more unbelievable is the fact that the church can and do still utilitise this anachronistic law to extort money for the upkeep of crumbling buildings with congregations probably numbering single figures. I'm totally baffled. Seems our only option is to pay the (admittedly tiny) insurance premium and suck it up.
I half expected to see the solicitors letter dated April 1st.
Has anyone else been stung by this injustice?
I feel a letter to my MP coming on.

Anyway, must dash. I don't want to be late for compulsory longbow practice... :rolleyes:
 
We had this on a property we purchased, our solicitor just advised us that we could take out a fairly cheap insurance policy against it. Problem solved
 
BJimmy sounds like he will help but I've been in a similar situation. I was advised it remains a liability after a recent review of all extant such liabilities.
You can take out a transferrable Chancel Liability Insurance and I would ask your sellers to do so before you move in for whatever value your solicitor suggests.
Cheers
 
This is just as archaic as the fact that shooting rights can still be owned by someone other than the landowner. Drives me mad - sounds like ww3 on my farm now the partridge season has begun, and there's sweet FA I can do about it. Bloody pheasants in their thousands have trashed my crops, and the shoot owner had the nerve to have a go at me for trying to round up my sheep when they were driving the neighbouring fields. Like chancel repair, this should be dumped in the dustbin of history. Let me choose who shoots on my farm, and whether or not I want to contribute to church funds.
 
This is just as archaic as the fact that shooting rights can still be owned by someone other than the landowner. Drives me mad - sounds like ww3 on my farm now the partridge season has begun, and there's sweet FA I can do about it. Bloody pheasants in their thousands have trashed my crops, and the shoot owner had the nerve to have a go at me for trying to round up my sheep when they were driving the neighbouring fields. Like chancel repair, this should be dumped in the dustbin of history. Let me choose who shoots on my farm, and whether or not I want to contribute to church funds.

I wonder if the owner of the shooting rights on your farm wants to buy the farm off you with all its associated running costs? I doubt it some how. it sounds like a ridiculous right left over from a bygone era. I would be livid if I was in your situation.
 
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I wonder if the owner of the shooting rights on your farm wants to buy the farm off you with all its associated running costs? I doubt it some how. it sounds like a ridiculous right left over from a bygone era. I would be livid if I was in your situation.

Well it does **** me off a bit when I see the guy advertising one day's shooting for £10,000 which is more than I make in a year! He's just a parasite, making a living off other people's land thanks to having acquired the right to do so without the landowners in the area even being told what was going on. But hey-ho, better not hijack the thread any longer....
 
SS, be very, very, very wary of this. If you don't have insurance it can potentially cost thousands. You have three choices: Take the risk, take adequate watertight insurance against ir, walk away from the deal. My advice is walk away. No property is worth a headache and in addition of the vendor has "concealed" this from you then |I would be somewhat peeved to say the bloomin' least!
 
This is just as archaic as the fact that shooting rights can still be owned by someone other than the landowner.

This should have been well apparent when the property was purchased. So I don't know how it could have been bought without that knowledge. As to redress for damages then |i would contact the NFU or similar who will know the case law on this. Thousands of pheasants are no more nor less an agricultural pest if you've no right to shoot them.
 
SS - Enfield Spares is about right with his three choices, but please rely on your solicitor not us for the legal answer. In terms of the commercial element I would simply ask the vendor to pay the insurance - and you may have to do the same for the next buyer when you sell. It is surprisingly quite cheap compared to the worst case scenario.

It is unusual to find an old house in the UK without some seemingly archaic liabilities attached, so if you can insure against it I don't think you are at risk of a headache much worse than many other houses you might end up buying. But check with your solicitor, it is their job to advise.

ES
 
This should have been well apparent when the property was purchased. So I don't know how it could have been bought without that knowledge. As to redress for damages then |i would contact the NFU or similar who will know the case law on this. Thousands of pheasants are no more nor less an agricultural pest if you've no right to shoot them.

Yes, it was apparent, but 1) I was only 25 when I bought the place, so fairly naive and inexperienced; 2) we're not in a traditional game rearing / shooting area, and no-one had shot over the land for years and 3) the original titled landowner, Lord N__________, who retained the sporting rights when this part of the estate was sold off many years ago, never gave any indication that he would sell those rights. First we hear about it is after living here peacefully for 15 years, is that the exclusive sporting rights have all been sold to a big commercial concern.
 
Sounds very astute really. Buy the land, sell the land but keep the shooting rights. Make money on the sale of the land then more on the shooting rights.
 
OK. VSS then there may, perhaps, be adverse possession. In that if they owner of a right has failed to exercise that right then he/she loses that right. It is a very long time since I did my Land Law.

But I think that you may have had a case in those fifteen years...but it depends on how recently they have been re-visited by this incomer. However after 2002 the law changed. So you need to seek correct and current legal advice.

Also there may be mileage in the fact that erecting a shooting pen for pheasants may not be covered by "shooting rights" so you maybe able to demand that pens be taken down or rent paid for their continuation.

As traditionally "shooting rights" may have been rights to wander with a gun AND take wild game but not to erect a pheasant pen nor erect feeding stations. Again seek legal advice.
 
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Yes, it was apparent, but 1) I was only 25 when I bought the place, so fairly naive and inexperienced; 2) we're not in a traditional game rearing / shooting area, and no-one had shot over the land for years and 3) the original titled landowner, Lord N__________, who retained the sporting rights when this part of the estate was sold off many years ago, never gave any indication that he would sell those rights. First we hear about it is after living here peacefully for 15 years, is that the exclusive sporting rights have all been sold to a big commercial concern.


You could always invite everyone off here that owns a quad or utv to come down once a week for a month before the start of the season and just ride about making a noise. Wouldn't think there would be many birds about then to attract big money. I know it goes a little quiet on our shoot for a while after a motocross.
They may own the shooting rights but not sole access to the land :D
 
It is really, as shooting rights Surely give rights to keep birds on the land and right of access any time of day or night?
 
Oh! That's nasty RodP. As is letting the land for pony paddocks and then having the pony and horse owners sue the shooting rights holder for any damages suffered by the horses. Or else just spread muck down where the guy pegs his guns. Do you own the woodlands? Again a "nuclear option" is to fell all the trees save the ones that form the natural edge of the wood and to take up all the hedgerows.
 
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