In this week’s Property Surveying blog post, we are going to be looking at party wall surveying procedures.
Particularly, we are going to be looking at the scenarios that come into play when an adjoining owner is in the process of selling their property.
First and foremost, it is important to note that the blog post will assume that Party Wall Notices have been served or that the party wall procedures have been commenced by way of a notice service.
Building owners will often find themselves in the situation whereby their property adjoins another property which is in the process of being sold.
SOLD STC
The key point to note is that for this to formally come into play and become an issue, the property must have been legally sold.
Legally sold comes in the form of the property being exchanged.
From the moment the property has been exchanged to when the Land Registry Title Register will be updated and changed can be anywhere from one month up to six months.
Despite 2019 and Covid being well in the past, the Land Registry is still suffering from severe backlog and delay that resulted from this, thereby still resulting in day-to-day issues on a daily basis which has trickled down to delays of this manner.
In practice, what this means is that the party wall surveyor serving the Party Wall Notice will not be able to have a legal means to formally and correctly obtain the legal ownership details of the adjoining owner.
Ordinarily, party wall surveyors and other legal practitioners will rely upon the Land Registry Title Register download to satisfy and validate whom the legal owner of a property is.
This is never more prevalent than in party wall surveying, as party wall surveyors will rely on that information to not only obtain the legal owner’s name, but also their contact and service details.
In absence of this information, the only other option that the party wall surveyor has at their disposal is to serve to a conspicuous owner.
Conspicuous Owners Party Wall Notices
In the scenario whereby the building owner or building owner’s surveyor is unaware of who the adjoining owner is, and has no means of accessing that information, the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 does and has taken this scenario into account.
The building owner or building owner’s party wall surveyor will therefore need to address the Party Wall Notice directly to “the owner”.
In doing this, they will be ensuring that the correct person receives the Party Wall Notice. However, this is not all they will need to do.
They will also need to ensure that the Party Wall Notice is physically fixed, taped or secured to a conspicuous part of the adjoining owner’s property.
Conspicuous positions and places will often mean the front door, the front gate, a window, gatepost, porch post etc.
The key consideration here, is that the Notice cannot be overlooked or missed and ultimately that the new owner of the property can easily access, locate and then in due course review and respond to the Party Wall Notice.
Fail Proof?
This is of course not a fail proof plan, as ultimately Notice service in this manner can be missed.
For example, if the property was to have professional cleaners, moving companies, tenancies, or managing agent inspections, all of these could result in the conspicuous Notice service being removed from its point of secure fitting, and being placed amongst the other end of ownership mail that could often collect in post boxes, hallways, window sills or at the foot of doors.
It is important to note that the conspicuous Notice service is not reserved for the single and initial Party Wall Notice.
All following services will need to take place in the same manner.
This will be true of the 10(4) Party Wall Notice which is served 10 days after the initial Party Wall Notice.
The confirmation that a party wall surveyor has been appointed under Section 10(4) of the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 on behalf of the non-responsive, for non-identified adjoining owner.
The request for access sent to the adjoining owner by the newly appointed party wall surveyor in accordance with Section 10(4) of the Party Wall etc. Act 1996. Finally, the Party Wall Award itself, which will be served by the adjoining owner’s party wall surveyor upon the unresponsive and unidentified adjoining owner.
Administration
This therefore results in a significant administrative task that the adjoining owner’s party wall surveyor will be signing up to.
Ultimately, when in combination with the building owner’s party wall surveyor, both will need to have visited the adjoining owner’s property in addition to 5 different times to secure and post the various different letters and documents to the conspicuous part of the adjoining owner’s property.
If you are planning on undertaking construction works to your property, and have come to the attention that Party Wall Notices are due, while you can rely on a party wall surveyor to serve the Party Wall Notice, you can also go through the process of serving your own Party Wall Notice.
While the Party Wall Notice is a legal document, there is no statutory provisions setting out that it has to be served by a legal practitioner.
The beauty of this, is that it opens up the door and opportunity for adjoining owners to be able to serve their own Party Wall Notices. Here at Stokemont, while we recognise that many adjoining owners will be able to serve their own Party Wall Notices, we would actually only recommend they are served in scenarios whereby the adjoining owner is on very good terms with the building owner, is well aware of the planned construction works, and has ultimately already verbally confirmed how they intend to respond to those Party Wall Notices.
If indeed, there have not been these types of discussions, we would advise that building owners consider their own Party Wall Notice service.
Ultimately, by selecting a party wall surveyor to serve their Party Wall Notices, they are giving the adjoining owner an all important contact to get in touch with to discuss the building owner’s planned works. This initial discussion, however brief it is, can often go a significant way to reduce the adjoining owner’s need or want to appoint a different party wall surveyor on their behalf.
Free Party Wall Notice
Here at Stokemont, we do have a free Party Wall Notice creator. We would advise that you take a look at this if indeed you are planning on serving your own Party Wall Notice.
Thank you for clicking on today’s Property Surveying blog post, we hope it has been an easy read and of good guidance.
If you would like to request a topic for us to cover, we would be very happy to consider this and ultimately aim to provide it to you.
All you need to do is click on the request a topic button on our main property surveying blog page. Alternatively, you can also pop us an email, or give us a call, we will be more than happy to assist and advise you.
