Home Loans - Tips for Legal Scrutiny

Legal Verification of a property (home) is an important step in the processing of a home loan. Banks usually make a careful study into the details of a property before approving a home loan. They scrutinize all the documents provided by the home loan seeker.

For the convenience of their customers, owners of some properties or ventures get the approval from certain banks to make the loan process easy. In other cases, home loan seekers have to collect and provide all the required details to a bank by themselves. For this, one should be should be aware of the entire legal verification process and support it for a clear and marketable title over the property that he/she intends to buy.

Banks will thoroughly go through all the documents of the property submitted by a home loan seeker. The panel advocates then send the documents to the concerned sub-registrar office to get the search report and details of the documents. If they find any discrepancy in the search report, they will ask for further clarification or for some additional documents to complete the legal scrutiny process. Hence, prior to going for a home loan, it is advisable to make a careful study of all the documents of the property as it saves your time; also you will have a clear idea about the legality of the property.

Owning a house is certainly a difficult task but it is a life time achievement. Hence one should not hesitate in spending a small amount in legal verification of the property that he/she intends to buy.

The following are few important tips that help you to get a clear and marketable title over the property that you want to acquire:

1. Before acquiring a property, go to the concerned sub-registrar office and apply for Encumbrance Certificate (EC) recording all sale transactions over that property for the last 15 years.


2. Apply for Certified copies of all the documents to get the details of the previous executors and executants.


3. Read all the registered documents to check whether there have any mortgages created over that property.


4. Check all the registered documents to know if there are any unsolved legal proceedings over that property.


5. If the present vendor is not available then check with the legal heirs of the property.


6. Apply for a Land Use certificate in the Urban Development authority to get the details and survey numbers and usage of the land.


7. Check if the layout is approved from the concerned authorities in case of a plot.


8. Estimate the property with the Government-approved Valuers in the market.


9. Check and verify the dimensions of the property.


10. Get a legal scrutiny report from an advocate before going for a home loan even if the property is already approved in the bank.


11. Take all the original documents from the previous vendor once the property is registered on your name.


12. Take an affidavit if any spelling mistakes are there in the name of the vendor when compared to the ID proof.