Special care needs to be taken preparing a Notice of Claim under section 42 of the Property (Relationships) Act 1976 when the claimant’s spouse, civil union or de facto partner (‘spouse or partner’) is not the registered owner of the affected record of title.

In the electronic Notice of Claim form, the ‘Spouse, Civil Union or De Facto Partner’ field defaults to the name of the registered owner and needs to be changed.

The check box ‘Change due to Pending Dealing’ allows you to insert the spouse or partner’s name in place of the registered owner's and can be used whether or not a pending dealing exists (see Fig.1 below). This can be used when the claimant expects his or her spouse or partner to become the registered owner by some future dealing. And it can also be used in other circumstances e.g. where the registered owner holds the land as trustee for the claimant’s spouse or partner.

Whenever the claimant’s spouse or partner is not the registered owner, the notice must include information to show how the claimant’s interest is derived from the registered owner through their spouse or partner, in the field headed ‘Derivation from Registered Owner (if applicable)’ (see Fig.2 below).

A pre-validation failure will display as a result of the entered name differing from the registered owner, but as the dealing is e-lodge you can continue with submitting.

Fig.1

Electronic Notice of Claim form, ‘Spouse, Civil Union or De Facto Partner’ fig. 1

Fig.2

Example of Derivation from Registered Owner