Knights Construction (March) Limited v Roberto Mac Limited, The Chief Land Registrar (Fraud, Forgery, Duress and Undue Influence): LRA 9 Feb 2011

LRA On voluntary first registration in 2007, the land registered by mistake included land the paper title to which was vested in the Applicant. It adjoined a block of flats and shops and was used, for the most part under rights granted by their leases, for car parking and waste bins by the tenants. One part was fenced off with the common parts of the flats and had been used as a drying area by the tenants but was now derelict. The car parking area had been tarmaced by the Applicant in 1985 when the development was built but had been neglected since then and was open to the road. The newly registered proprietor sold the land with the adjoining building to the Respondent in 2009, and the transfer was registered. The Respondent cleared and fenced the land, but was immediately met with protests from the tenants and the Applicant. The fencing was then removed and pending resolution of the dispute as to ownership the land was used for parking by all parties and continued to be used for the residential tenants’ bins. Most of the tenancies were on long leases without any rent being payable. There were two flats let on assured shorthold tenancies.
Held: 1. The Respondent was not in possession of the land for the purposes of paragraph 6 of Schedule 4 to the Land Registration Act 2002.
2. The Applicant was in actual occupation of the fenced off drying area in a manner that should have been obvious to the Respondent on a reasonably careful inspection, so that the Respondent’s registered title was subject to the Applicant’s interest by virtue of paragraph 3 of Schedule 3 to the Land Registration Act 2002 and the Applicant was entitled to have the register altered to remove that land from the Respondent’s title.

Citations:

[2011] EWLandRA 2009 – 1459

Links:

Bailii

Statutes:

Land Registration Act 2002

Jurisdiction:

England and Wales

Registered Land

Updated: 29 April 2022; Ref: scu.429534