[2025] UKUT 144 (LC)

The two plans below show, first, the title plan to number 4 as it stood before the registrar gave effect to the respondent’s application (the shading represents an area added to the title in 1996) and, second, the title plan to number 2 with the disputed land shaded, again before the alteration. The disputed land comprises a garage with an “up and over” door, and a drive in front of it on which a car can be parked. The garage has a side door into the garden of number 4.

Mr Iwaskiewicz bought number 4 in 2000. His evidence was that when he bought the property he believed that the disputed land was part of it; the estate agent’s brochure, which is in the appeal bundle, stated that number 4 included a “driveway for 1 car with detached garage leading to up and over door”. Mr Iwaskiewicz said that he parked on the drive and made use of the garage for storage without objection until 2019, when Mr Suhitharan bought number 2. Mr Suhitharan objected to Mr Iwaskiewicz parking on the drive, and in May 2019 put up a retractable bollard to prevent him from doing so. In June 2019 Mr Iwaskiewicz made his application to HM Land Registry.

Mr Iwaskiewicz did not produce the deed transferring title to him. Nor did he produce his solicitors’ conveyancing file from 2000. His argument before the FTT was that pre-registration deeds from the 1940s and before show that the disputed land was part of the title to number 4 and that therefore there must have been a mistake on first registration when the disputed land was omitted from his title. He offered no information as to when first registration took place.