Case from the Lands Tribunal for Scotland considering an application for rectification of a number of inaccuracies in the Land Register.
Highland Ventures was the former owner of a hotel in Crieff. The company sold the hotel (whilst retaining some land for the personal use of a director and his wife) to a Mr Sancto in 2006 (the transaction triggered first registration) and the property was registered the Land Register. The hotel was subsequently repossessed and the bank sold it to MMSL, at which point Highland Ventures became aware of inaccuracies in Mr Sancto’s registered title.
The possibility of inaccuracy in the register was raised with the Keeper in November 2014. At that time, section 9 of the Land Registration (Scotland) Act 1979 was in force. Under s9, except in very limited circumstances, it is not possible to rectify the register to the prejudice of the proprietor in possession (in this case, MMSL). The application to the Lands Tribunal was made after the “designated day” on which the Land Registration etc. (Scotland) Act 2012 came into force[1]. The tribunal found that, in terms of the 2012 Act, transitional provisions[2] applied under which there is a presumption[3] that the registered proprietor (in this case MMSL) is in possession of the property. However, in this case the Tribunal found that Highland Ventures (which led evidence of use of the property by the director and his wife) had demonstrated possession of the subjects and consequently had rebutted the presumption that MMSL possessed the subjects.
As such, the tribunal found that that register was inaccurate and that the presumption in favour of the possession of the registered proprietor had been rebutted.
The full decision is available from the Lands Tribunal for Scotland here.
All of our property and conveyancing case summaries are contained in the LKS Property and Conveyancing Casebook here.
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[1] 8 December 2014.
[2] Contained in Schedule 4 of the 2012 Act.
[3] Para 18 of Schedule 4.
