Families Robbed Of Gardens After Register Blunder

Feb 24 2008 Additional Reporting By Jane Barrie

A GROUP of homeowners have gone to war with their builder after being told they do not own their gardens.

The 12 families fear they will never be able to sell their homes because of a paperwork blunder.

Turnberry Homes, who sold the plots in Motherwell three years ago, insist the gardens belong to the owners.

But the Land Register lists the rear of the properties in Macrius Way as "common ground" so the residents have no claim over them.

Stuart McCartney, who lives at No.19, only found out about the mistake when it caused his house sale to fall through.

Now he and his wife Jane face crippling mortgage payments for the house and the new home he had bought. He expects to lose £15,000.

Stuart, 33, said: "I am furious. I'm basically in limbo with my life on hold until this is sorted.

"I bought the property in good faith with a back garden. To be told now that I might not own it is nothing short of ridiculous."

IT sales manager Stuart and wife Jane paid £118,995 for their home in August 2005.

But Registers of Scotland spotted a problem with the back gardens in October of that year.

Stuart said: "All the odd numbers in the street are affected. It seems the land used for our gardens was initially owned by the developer who built the estate behind ours.

"It was registered as common ground but Turnberry bought it from them and built on it." Registers of Scotland say they raised the issue with Turnberry in October 2005 but the builder disputes this.

They did not contact the homeowners for another 18 months.

By then Stuart and Jane had put a deposit down on another house and were selling theirs.

Stuart said: "It came as a bolt from the blue. Our new house will be ready in April and is costing £207,000 so we need the equity to be able to buy it."

The McCartneys called me in when their buyer pulled out over the garden issue.

Stuart said: "We asked Turnberry to buy the house back but they refused, insisting it was Registers of Scotland's fault.

"I don't care who is to blame but why should I be penalised for someone else's mistakes?"

Motherwell and Wishaw MP Frank Roy is backing the residents and the matter will be heard at a lands tribunal in April.

He said: "Turnberry Homes have a lot of questions to answer as the keeper of the Land Register is not satisfied that they have exclusive title in the area.

"They were happy to take people's money. The least they can do is sort the mess."

I got on to Turnberry, based in Glasgow. They said: "We are committed to resolving this as quickly as possible."

But Registers of Scotland said: "We identified a title problem but Turnberry took a different view.

"It is going to the Lands Tribunal for a resolution."

If it doesn't now go to plan, you'll be the first to know.