An unusual tenancy problem

[quantum37]

I apologise for veering off into a rather strange type of tenancy. The situation is this some years ago my father was approached by a 15 year old lad who needed to keep his pigeon coops on some spare ground. My father generously allowed him to put two coops up and instead of rent the lad agreed to mow the grass in the area surrounding the coops and generally keep the area tidy. Anyway fast forward 20 years my father died 10 years ago and my mother senses that the nature of the agreement has changed. I am having to mow the grass and after 20 years we have invoiced the pigeon fancier for some rent. Our demands for rent have not been met. With the absence of a written agreement, I wonder whether the pigeon fancier has received some legal advice and been told not to pay the rent so as not to create a formal arrangement. I am still cutting the grass and wondering where this is all leading

[Richlist]

I suggest you get some urgent legal advice as this can get very complex.

In the absence of any formal agreement or at least any agreement that can be verified the user of the land may have acquired :

* Adverse Possession &/or

* Prescriptive Rights

The Land Registration Act of 2002 (came into force 13.10 2003) makes adverse possession of registered land virtually impossible. However unregistered land does not enjoy the same level of protection. If your land is unregistered then you should consider voluntary registration to acquire said protection from adverse claims.

[Grampa]

I agree, you need to get specialised legal advice from a property solicitor NOT A BOG STANDARD HIGH STREET SOLICITOR.

Though saying that for the purpose of getting a reponse from the person and getting some dialog going you could try writing to the person and send 2 copies one by recorded delivery and one with proof of postage. Maybe one pinned to the coops.

You could say something along the lines of .

Due to a change of personal circumstances you are formally been given one months notice to remove any personal items from the land in question located at xxxxxxxxxx. Please reply by xx/xx/xx. If you do not reply by xx/xx/xx that will be taken as acceptance and any items will be disposed of.

Do not act after one month, this letter is to get them talking to you and if they have taken legal advice they will get back to you and let you know.. I would not mention anything about rent payment either.

[Mortitia]

Agree with the advice as given above - mistake to ask for the rent IMO

How big were the pigeon sheds and did he gain access to them latterly by a vehicular roadway of some sort on the land?

[Melboy]

Slightly off topic but a tale non the less........

Years ago we backed onto a public footpath which led to a property. It was never used very much by the public but was quite wide and enough to take a car to the distant property.

A builder wanted to build houses on adjacent land to this property and tried to claim this dirt track as a new road for access to 4 new properties. There was no way of diverting the public right of way to allow this. Nobody actually new who owned this track it was just "there" even the distance property had no ownership rights and didn't even have a legal right to pass over it but had done so since time began.

To cut a long story short we had a fight on our hands and to get it resolved we had to produce 4 people from the village who had walked this public right of way more than 30 years ago. Well, we did just that an 80 x 2 & a 92 &75 year old Men and Woman came forward who used to walk this footpath as a short cut to the now defunct railwayway station half a mile away.

The application was rejected.....eventually.

We have some crazy laws when it comes to land ownership and rights of way in the UK.

[Richlist]

You have to remember that until relatively recently unregistered property was the norm.

The Land Registry is a very recent development. Usually an unregistered property is only registered at the Land Registry (for the first time) by the buyer, when the property is next sold. Land Registration has simplified and improved ownership disputes and issues significantly but no system is 100% foolproof.

For hundreds of years the only way of confirming ownership was by conveyances going back through all the previous owners.

Anyone with unregistered property should swallow the relatively small cost and go for voluntary registration.

I tried to make an adverse possession claim some years back but had missed the opportunity by a few months. Although my claim was valid and I met all of the claim criteria, the land owner had voluntary registered the land just a few months previously making my claim void. However, I do qualify for prescriptive rights.

[Chestnut]

From some experience on land ownership issues resolved by Registration, I concur with Richlist's points. It is not such an unusual problem.

As a priority you need to check with Land Registry and make sure this land is registered in your name as owner. Otherwise, after all the years of his use, the pigeon coop owner could claim the access rights and area under his coops as his, and you might get nowhere.

[quantum37]

I should like to thank everyone for taking the time to reply to my post and for certainly illuminating some facts that will assist in me taking swift and correct action.