Agricultural Land Sale & Purchase

The development of land starts before the planning application is made.

The first part of the process is establishing a clearly defined and appropriate relationship between the landowner and the developer or promoter.

This requires a properly negotiated agreement setting out the rights and obligations of the parties and the timescales by which the various actions under the agreement must be carried out.

In negotiating such agreements the important point for the solicitors to bear in mind is that all parties want to achieve a planning permission which gives to the landowner the appropriate price for his land whilst permitting the person who is developing the land an appropriate return on his investment.

There are various sorts of agreement relating to land development include Conditional Contracts, Options and Promotion Agreements. 

Overage

This is a relatively new (in legal terms!) area which has been developing over the last 40 years or so. It is also known as Clawback and Uplift.

It provides a Seller with a method of selling a property at a particular price (usually calculated by reference to the use of the property at the time of the sale) but also reserving the ability to receive more money in the future if certain pre agreed events happen, examples are:-

• The grant or implementation of a planning permission for change of use
• The sale of land with the benefit of a planning permission for change of use
• The intensification of use

Overage provisions are often used by private and commercial landowners and by Local Authorities.

As this is a developing area of law and there have not yet been many decided cases practical experience and an excellent understanding of the complex legal  issues involved is essential when Overage terms are being negotiated and put into legal documentation.

It is one of those areas where it is very easy to say the expression but the detail required to make it operate as the Seller and Buyer intend and to make sure future landowners are tied in is considerable.

We have  many years of experience of negotiating and creating  overage documentation  and indeed have  supervised overage payments  actually being made when the  specified event has occurred.

If you are contemplating a transaction with overage please do talk to one of our team as early as possible.

Building Licences

In addition to those the developer will require satisfactory finance agreements.

Bevirs have lawyers with many years’ experience in acting on behalf of landowners and developers and is ideally placed to assist to bring negotiations between the parties to a successful conclusion.

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