Private Road being Granted to Residents

[Mr Me]

Hi, after much debate our private road, with around a dozen freehold houses on it, will be granted to us from the building/management company (who don't want it) to the residents. We are in the early stages now, haven't yet appointed a solicitor but wanted to see if anyone has been through this before or had any useful tips? Obviously we will register a Ltd company for the road, have a article of association showing people can enter and leave etc. as well as costs etc. etc. will probably get a website so this can be viewed easily.

If anyone has done something similar and knows what costs to expect, what banana skins may be lurking and any general thoughts, it would be greatly appreciated.

[dslippy]

What is needed depends directly on how the land was described on the conveyances. In particular you need to make sure that the Land Registry will not (for free) simply add the half shares of the road to the titles. It is not impossible.

Will the LA not adopt it? It would need to be brought up to standard first.

Do you know the routes of the mains supplies and drains along it.

The arrangements you suggest need to be cosicered carefully to make sure that it will all work when two or three house owners are not co-operating.

There is a reason the building company want rid. What is it? Are they paying you to take it?

A limited company arrangement will complicate every future sale and purchase / mortgage of a house.

Are people ready to pay a service charge - roads need repairing and resurfacing and insuring.

[Mr Me]

Hi DSLIPPY thank you for the reply:

We wouldn't want LA to adopt it, it's a small cul-de-sac, only people that use it are the residents.

Supply routes not yet known, don't see an issue with this though...? Conveyancer will go through this I'm sure and the plans will be floating around somewhere.

As I understand it not all the residents may want to be involved. The fees will be minimal so if anyone stops paying fees and stamps their feet then they simply will not be able to sell in the future.

I have pushed for the building company to give it to us. They don't know how to run a private road, don't want it, don't want any hassle and we gain nothing from them. Any repairs etc. will need to be covered by us regardless of who owns it, they are a friendly society so any huge issues would result in not much legal come back to them. They aren't paying us for the road and wouldn't be in a position to. They are covering their own legal fees. Frankly we will be glad to see the back of them, little gets done with them and it will be much better to own the road ourselves and sort out minor issues. Any major ones under their ownership basically means they contact a trade company to fix the issue and charge us for the admin time. They don't make money from the current agreement and is a drag to their time. It is also a drag to our time as any small issues need to go through them which sometimes they literally ignore.

Ltd company route is agreed and the only real route to take with an open ended enter and leave for homeowners. It may complicate it slightly but other private roads operate in the same way, this will be nothing unusual for a privately owned cul-de-sac road. I've spoken to 2 friends who have the same set up, they came into it rather than setting it up but no hassle has been discussed other than residents not paying the service charge on occasion. With a dozen houses here the charges will be minimal and mainly there to build up a slush fund as it's a new estate of around 3 years old.

We already pay a small service charge to the existing owners of the road.

[dslippy]

You seem to have thought it through, but again, much depends upon the existing transfers of the houses.
Do make sure that the road is in appropriate condition first.