Solicitor preventing our house sale

Has the neighbours property use of the alleyway in question?

If no genuine reason for their claim, I'd back out of the saleand not be dealing with bullsh1t.

The issue is the neighbour is likely to register a caution on the folio, so it will appear as a matter or course when any new purchaser goes to buy, regardless of what solicitor they use.

The claim by the neighbour needs to be concluded one way or another. Otherwise you are just kicking the can down the road.

It’s a legal mechanism whereby the neighbour would petition the property registration authority to record a ‘caution’ or note on the OP’s registered title. If the PRA agreed, (and the bar isn’t very high) this would have the effect of formally highlighting the claim to any future purchaser and also generating a statutory requirement for the neighbour to be put on notice of any dealings in the land.

Effectively it makes the property very difficult to sell. If registered, the OP could make an application to the PRA have it removed, but more likely would need to seek an order of the courts to remove it.

The registering of cautions is open to abuse and is often done a as means to frustrate sales by banks in repossession cases for example.

Never heard of this before, that is absolutely wild.

I'm amazed there aren't loads of cases of people chancing their arm for a few quid pay-off like we're seeing with planning objections.

Inform Revenue of the neighbours renting for cash, cancel the sale and put it back on the market.

It would be registered on your folio. The ‘cautioner’ would presumably be the person who claims to be the owner of the adjoining land.

Incidentally, the point at which it became a mandatory requirement to register title with land registry varied by local authority.

I think you're caught here. You will have to declare the dispute to any potential buyer. I presume the neighbour is either claiming ownership of the alleyway or a right of way over it? If you dont declare the dispute on the "replies to requisitions" then you could be sued by a new purchaser should they suffer a future loss.

So only way is getting a court order declaring neighbour has no legal right to your property title. This could take years. You could declare this dispute when selling but then you may be limited to only selling to cash buyers.

Is there anyway you can sell your house and leave out the alleyway. Ie just sell the undisputed part of your folio.

Do you know how they're trying to claim ownership? Are they claiming the alleyway is on their title deeds or claiming it by adverse possession?

Land registry have a disclaimer that boundaries shown on their maps are for identification purposes and not proof of ownership.

If the alleyway is shown on your original property deeds which would have been used to register your property and the alleyway is also on your neighbours original deeds. Then the older of the two would be the owner. Originally there would have been a common owner of the land the properties are on. This owner split the land by selling one piece on and retaining the other. Which ever piece they sold first showing alleyway would be the owner as the original common owner couldn't have sold it on again after. If the original common owner sold both properties simultaneously to different people both showing the alleyway on title deeds then the situation is very complicated.

I think people claiming rights need to have some factual evidence to back up thier claim or else you could bring an injunction for tresspass? But before you would do this engage with them to see what they have to back up their claim.

General question
"buyers solicitor has recently called our estate agent to look for 10k reduction that would be used to buy off neighbour. "

is this an assumption or is this what the solicitor said.

Is their solictior saying, the neighbour wants 10k, and the buyer would give it? why would the buyer give it? wouldn't the seller do this then have it in writing for any future purchasers off the house?

Or are you assuming the 10k is going to the neighbour…. . how would this work, the buyer isnt just going to hand over 10k randomly

either way shouldn't it all be done before a sale is complete and nothing to do with the new buyer.

(I am in no way legal so may be way off here)

If it is true that a solicitor sought a reduction in those circumstances, he should be reported to the Law Society. He is utterly conflicted with two clients who are at the opposite end of a dispute.

There is another thread at the moment about a deceased estate dispute that has dragged 7 years and where the executor is a legal clerk in a law firm.

In some other countries, one might suspect the executor of having a conflict of interest. That thread has had quite a few posts, with a few mine, and not once has anyone commented on this. Talk of barrristers being needed, I'm shocked. /s

he is in possession of confidential information from one client which he is using to benefit the position of another client. Unless the two clients have expressly waived the conflict, he has either broken client confidentiality in one side (and possible data protection) or he fails to provide best advice to the other client.

Guessing that the conveyence of two previous owners was the first time the property was ever sold or demised as that property? The very first conveyance of the property would be important. Since you now know the date of that conveyance do you have the original conveyance deed map of your property? If your map predates thiers and shows alleyway I dont see how they could rebutt it. Although your property has now been registered your solicitor should have kept the original deeds.

Btw if you do want to give up on the alleyway to make a sale easier you can look into getting a "deed rectification" by the land registry. This is where both parties agree that there is a mistake in the boundary and both agree to a new boundary. However i have only herd this being done when both properties are registered. In your case neighbour is not registered. Also you believe your neighbours motive is just to extract a ransome payment so you can't sell your property so they might not agree to a deed rectification that would end the dispute. However by offering this and them refusing would clearly highlight to anyone that their objective is just to delay your sale so they can extract a ransome payment should it go to court.