GeoffF100 wrote:Here is a sobering article, "Could fraudsters steal your home from under your nose?":
https://hoa.org.uk/2019/06/fraud-steal-your-home/I have signed up to the Land Registry Property Alerts Service, which is free. You can check the register for £3, but I have not done that. I have the solicitor's letters from when I bought the house, and Zoopla shows that as the last sale. It is generally recommended that we check our files with the three credit reference agencies at least once a year.
Although this is by now well known, it is as well to have a reminder every so often, so thanks for flagging it up again. The whole thing reveals a great flaw in the Land Registry - or at least a misunderstanding which we, the public, have about it. Their POV is that they don't exist to check and investigate, only to
register what they have been told by a solicitor or other professional body.
It is also worrying that the timescale for objecting is so short - there must be many retired folk who go on long trips abroad and couldn't "pop back" to check the post every couple of weeks. Three weeks is nothing if you are visiting children in NZ! And who would trust a tenant in a BTL to inform you of letters arriving? Over the years, I might hear about some post arriving, but usually not until I call in to see the tenants for a check up.
In fact, I know of only one tenant who was/is proactive in texting me if a letter arrives in my name.
Safeguards are to keep the mortgage or get a charge for a loan against the property ( to a relative, for example), register additional alternative contact addresses and email addresses with the land registry, or get a solicitor to put a covenant on the property saying that it cannot be sold without another relative being informed or agreeing.
Anything you can do to make it less easy would encourage a fraudster to look elsewhere, but I don't see any real defence against incompetent, slapdash or criminal solicitors. Even the mortgage isn't 100% sound as demonstrated by Barclays last year. They made a huge error in taking off the charge from about 40,000 properties and "closing" the mortgages. It caused so much work that the LR set up a separate team to deal with it.
And the property alerts might help, but they are often several weeks or months after the search event they are reporting.
Arb.