Land purchase/Right of way

Vanilla said:

Not sure if Orga is a solicitor since normal practice is that money would NOT exchange hands until contracts were signed, and even at that would be held on trust until closing, so you should be careful about taking advice from another anonymous poster with an evident lack of knowledge of the conveyancing process ( as evidenced by other posts above).

You may have paid out money, but not to the farmer which is the relevant issue.

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That's one way of doing business(what is described above as "normal" practice) but in many cases in the real world a consideration does change hands, in some cases recorded, in some not, in some cases it's called a deposit etc etc.

“Finally, I would simply proceed and not worry too much about the legal niceties. Who knows that you don't have right of way? Being realistic your neighbours are unlikely in the extreme to ever know this unless you go making an issue of it. Build bridges with them, get to know them and you'll find yourself with good neighbours and a lot less worry. Don't let your solicitor worry you - the task for him/her is to solve your problems and to give you an assessment as to how likely these are to cause a problem. If he/she can't do that then you should terminate your relationship with them.”

The problem with not dealing with “legal niceties” is that you are taking risks. The problem with the lack of a proper right of way is that OP cannot show good title i.e. that the land is not land locked. This creates problems with ever selling or mortgaging. It is not the solicitor’s role to solve this client’s problems. The solicitor’s role is to assess the problem, see if there are solutions and offer those solutions to the client. It is for the client to then decide what to do. I think the OP’s solicitor has indicated to the OP that they cannot certify good title because at the moment good title ( or what is called “good marketable title”) does not exist. If the solicitor will not do that, the answer is not to terminate the relationship but rather to listen to the advice being given – even if it is not what you want to hear.


“You should appear resolute in your approach to this matter. You should also casually drop this question when next you meet your solicitor: what happens if I give up on this site and someone else gets it later on and the title issue turns out not to be an issue, would I have comeback against anybody? If his answer is no, no comeback at all or that will never happen then you should smile and nod and say "Oh! I see". In a few days you should drop in again/phone and ask if he had received any other opinion in relation to certifying the title and if he hasn't would it be worth doing?”

I'm really struggling with this approach. It sounds as if its possible to bully the solicitor into doing something i.e. confirming that there is in fact no problem when there patently is. From all the posts, it sounds as if OP did not take any legal advice when dealing with the farmer and only did so after planning permission had been granted. At that stage, the title issue became apparent. It would have become patently apparent very early on if the OP had taken legal advice and not gone off on their own.

The OP has a choice – take it or leave it. It may or may not be an issue on a day to day basis but it will always be an issue when the property is to be sold or mortgaged. It is not for the solicitor to make that choice for OP. If the OP wants to pay for Counsels Opinion he should instruct the solicitor to obtain Counsels Opinion and he ( OP) should be willing to pay for that Opinion.

I think the OP is on a hiding to nothing and must himself decide whether to take it or leave it.

mf

Just as an aside, Ireland (and Property Authority) operates under what is known as a non-conclusive boundary system. All properties are defined as going to the centre of the road, if the road appears to be a public road. You cannot take the ordnance survey map in your situation as an indication that the surrounding home owners own the road by virtue of the Property Authority map. If the entire area that has been built upon was once owned totally by the farmer from whom you are purchasing a site, it is fairly certain that the road continues to be his, through omission, rather than having the road evidenced on a deed. Additionally, it is against planning authority directives on siting to give permission to a site that does not have access to a public road (which I assume this laneway would connect to). Has this never been an issue with any of your planning applications? One would assume that if there was a question, on the part of the county council, as to your public road access, they would have indicated this on your application. Your planning authority will have a map of the area that may very well indicate who is responsible for the road. However, in order to get to the bottom of this, you may have to do research, ie trace back the ownership of the total, original folio to Land Commission sales, Memorial of Deeds, etc. This is all a matter of public record. Your solicitor is responding to the letter of the law. Did all the homeowner abutting the lane purchase from the farmer who is selling to you? If so, you may want to ask them how they got around the issue of right of way. However, remember that although you may wish to purchase and build with these conditions, it may be very difficult/impossible to sell this parcel without road clarification.