Exploring Chancel Repair Liability with Cate Beavis from Thames Valley law firm Gardner Leader

What is Chancel Repair?

Chancel Repair Liability is a liability for certain properties to contribute towards the cost of repairs to the chancel of the parish church, writes Cate Beavis from Thames Valley law firm Gardner Leader.

The basis of chancel repair liability goes back hundreds of years to medieval times.

Some houses (and flats) stand upon land, which is still subject to this perpetual liability to make contributions towards repair.

Ok, but can it really affect homeowners?

Yes, it can. For many years, it was thought that this was something of interest only to academic lawyers and it was unlikely churches could now force any property owners to pay repair costs.

That view changed quickly when the courts decided that a homeowner in the village of Aston Cantlow, Warwickshire, still had to pay a large sum towards the cost of repairing the local church.

These demands are legally enforceable in the courts.

It does not matter whether or not the property owner is a member of the church, the liability attaches to the property.

Can you tell if a property is affected?

Yes, you can find out, but it isn’t always straightforward and, in the past, it was not always clear whether a particular property was subject to this liability.

Even if the liability was not referred to in the title deeds or in the Land Registry Title, the property could still be subject to the liability.

Only when churches were faced with rising repair costs and dwindling resources, did some realised they could recoup some costs from certain property owners and demanded payments.

When the current land registration system in England was established, there was an attempt to make sure all matters affecting a property were included in the Register of Title.

However, this didn’t work well as many matters, including Chancel Repair, were classified as ‘Overriding Interests’ which would continue to affect a property even when they were not mentioned in the title.

As a result, it became common for property solicitors to conduct a search to establish whether the property had a potential risk of Chancel Repair Liability (which in a large number of cases it did) and would then pay additional money for Indemnity Insurance if a potential liability was identified.

Other solicitors now insure against the risk as standard, as the insurance is as cheap as, if not cheaper, than the search to identify a risk.

Are things going to change?

Parliament attempted to change things in 2013; they decided that the law relating to all ‘overriding interests’ would be changed.

These changes were intended to make Title Registers more comprehensive.

The change required Chancel Repair liability, along with many other overriding interests, to be registered with the Land Registry by midnight on October 12, 2013, or they lost their automatic protection.

Churches can apply to register a notice against the title of affected properties in their parish.

Ok, so is Chancel Repair Liability is a problem of the past now?

No, Chancel Repair Liability is not being abolished.

In addition, the fact that a property hasn’t had a notice registered on it by a church by October 13, 2013, does not mean that the church has lost the right to apply for registration.

The church’s right will only be lost once a property with registered Title has changed hands since October 13, 2013, for ‘valuable consideration’ (ie for money or something else of value, not as a gift) or when an unregistered property is first registered after October 13, 2013.

So if the property I’m buying has been sold since 2013 there can’t be a risk of liability?

Unfortunately not. The Land Registry will register new chancel repair notices without checking whether the application is valid.

Therefore, even if a property was sold after October 2013, there remains a risk that notice of the liability will be added.

As a result of this legal grey area, we are still putting in place Chancel Repair Liability indemnity policies for our clients purchasing property.

If any such notice is added to your property, and it had been sold for value since 2013, you should write to the Land Registry to have the notice removed to avoid any future problems.