[2024] UKUT 335 (LC)

Finally, we have to look briefly at the registration of title to land. The grant of a lease for a term of more than 7 years out of a registered estate is a registrable disposition and it does not take effect at law until the lease is registered (section 27 of the Land Registration Act 2002). That provision is directly relevant to this appeal because the freeholder’s title is registered. The position is different when a term for more than seven years is granted out of an unregistered lease; such a lease does take effect immediately at law, despite not yet being registered. Nevertheless, if it is not registered within two months then the grant of the lease takes effect “as a contract for valuable consideration to grant or create the legal estate concerned” (section 7(2) of the Land Registration Act 2002). In other words, having been a legal lease for two months, the lease changes status if still unregistered after two months, and is thereafter an equitable lease until registered.