When you act on the purchase of registered land, the official copies are where your work begins. They are HM Land Registry's formal snapshot of who owns the property, what benefits it, and what burdens it — and your job as the buyer's solicitor is to read them properly, spot the problems, and resolve them before your client is committed. Get this right and the transaction runs smoothly; miss something and your client may be bound by a right they never knew about.
This lesson builds that skill from the ground up, in the order you'd meet these issues in practice.
- The Register of Title and Official Copies — the three registers, what each one tells you, and why the register isn't the whole story.
- Deduction and Investigation of Title — who does what between the two sides, and what you're checking for before exchange.
- Overriding Interests, Easements and Covenants — the rights that can bind your buyer without appearing on the register.
- Co-ownership, Notices and Restrictions — how to read what the register doesn't say, and how interests are protected.
- Classes of Title and Leasehold — what the state actually guarantees, and what to do when it's less than absolute.
- Charges, Searches and Corporate Sellers — clearing mortgages, protecting priority, and the extra checks for company sellers.