Paul Outhwaite's response

Thanks for your question.

Rights, such as that referred to in your question, are not usually registerable at the Land Registry.

In simple terms the Land Registry tend only to deal with ownership rather than rights granted to do or not to do something. Such rights can be for example, the right to park a motor car in a parking space or, as in this case, the right to use a driveway. They are quite common although more so for leasehold than freehold properties.

When the property that you refer to was originally registered, it is likely that it was subject to various covenants (promises) to do or not to do things. These could for example be maintaning boundaries or not causing a nuisance. They would have been included in a transfer document.

From what you say, the property also benefits from a right over the driveway edged blue and brown. The edging should appear on the original transfer plan which will be held by the Land Registry and should be made available to you by your solicitor.

As I said above the Land Registry do not always register rights and as a result do not always look into whether or not the original contracting parties were able to grant the rights. This is the reason why they have added the words, "so far as the transferor has power to grant the rights".

Whilst it is likely that they did have the power to grant the right and that the property therefore does benefit from the rights over the driveway, without seeing the paperwork, I would not be able to confirm definitively. The solicitors who are acting for you in the sale or purchase should be able to give you more guidance on the point.

I hope that this is of some help.