Property question please

[Jenn]

Hi there

This is nothing family related but if you could offer a bit of advice - that would be great

I am a Scout leader and my Scout group owns their own building (the building has been where it is for 60 ish years). However - we do not own the land that it is on and that belongs to the church. Before the group bought the hut - we used to meet in one of the church buildings.

We used to make a one off donation to the church (the money we received from letting our hut out as a polling station). We did this in goodwill, more as a gesture of thanks rather than rent payment or anything. However - our treasurer cannot remember exactly the last time we gave them this money so it was not recent.

We have approached the church several times in recent years about purchasing the land our hut sits on or trying to get a lease for it but they don't really want to do this.

A lot of the churches in our area recently closed and formed one big church and there is always a risk that the church may close (although we hope not)

So really - we were wondering if we have any rights to be there after being there that long. Can the church refuse to give us a lease for the land? Can they make us leave if they need to close the church or if they want to sell off the land?

We are hoping to raise money to make some large changes and renovations to our building but would really like to know how secure our position is?

Thank you for any help or advice you can offer

Jenny

[Lawyer Mark]

Jen, thanks for your question which is a very interesting one indeed and sadly could well be quite complex. If you wanted to give me a call on 01245 504904 (ask to speak to Mark) I'd be happy to discuss with you further but as some brief guidelines -

It appears you have two possibilities of obtaining 'rights' of possession. Firstly, adverse possession, where if you have occupied without the consent of an owner for 12 years or more you can acquire a right to ownership of that property. However the payment of money to the church within the last 12 years would defeat this.

Under the 1954 Landlord and Tenant act you could acquire the rights of a tenant due to lengthy occupation and be entitled to renew and pay a fair market rent and stop them turfing you out and letting someone else occupy that piece of land. However, if the owner wanted to dispose of the land for their own purposes so this would not prevent them terminating any tenancy rights you hold.

My gut instinct is that you are occupy more as a licensee and this can be revoked at any time.

Therefore before spending large amounts on renovation I would strongly suggest you approach the land owner and ask for some form of tenancy agreement to formalise the arrangement and ensure you are comfortable with it before spending your money.


I hope this is useful but feel free to call me.

regards
Mark

[Jenn]

Thank you for replying so quickly!

I will pass this info onto our treasurer and may well get back to you

Thanks