HM Land Registry published Practice Guide 84 on Monday 26th October 2026, explaining how developers and land promoters in England and Wales must report certain contractual control rights affecting registered land. The guidance is new, but the underlying regulations were made on 8th June 2026. They do not come into force today.
From 6th April 2027, details of some land options, conditional purchase contracts, pre-emption rights and arrangements within promotion agreements must be submitted digitally to HM Land Registry. The change does not itself grant planning permission or transfer ownership. It is about making influence over future land disposals more visible.
I would pay particular attention to the start date. Some contractual control rights created since 8th June 2026 will need reporting next year, even though the online service has not yet opened. Developers assembling sites now cannot safely assume that contracts signed in 2026 fall outside the new regime.
Which contractual control rights are covered?
The Provision of Information (Contractual Control) (Registered Land) Regulations 2026 concern defined rights over registered freehold land or qualifying long leasehold estates. They principally catch written rights enabling somebody to insist on, or direct, a future transfer or lease of land, provided the other statutory tests are met.
A familiar example is an option agreement allowing a promoter to purchase a field after obtaining planning permission. A conditional contract requiring a sale once specified conditions are satisfied can also qualify. So can a right of first refusal, or a contractual right to direct the owner to sell or grant a long lease to somebody else.
Not every private arrangement becomes reportable contractual control. Practice Guide 84 says the right must be held for the purposes of an undertaking, which can include a business, charity or public function. An individual buying a plot solely for a personal home may fall outside that definition. Whether the right meets the precise legal tests matters more than the label printed on the contract.
Which land rights are exempt?
The statutory schedule excludes rights whose maximum control period is shorter than 18 months. You must consider extensions when calculating that period: an initial 12-month option that can run longer while a planning appeal proceeds is not automatically exempt.
Other exemptions include rights held exclusively for non-development purposes, security for loans, certain rights protecting overage payments and rights for defence or national security. The non-development exemption is narrow: it does not generally help where an arrangement relates to building homes or to other building development creating at least 100 square metres of floorspace.
There is also a specific exclusion for some rights in section 106 agreements made with a local planning authority, where they relate exclusively to infrastructure, amenities or services linked to a planning permission. It does not follow that every agreement mentioning section 106 is automatically outside these rules. Our section 106 agreement guide explains what those obligations do in the planning process.
When must developers report contractual control?
The new contractual control reporting service opens on 6th April 2027. For a qualifying right first granted from 8th June 2026 to 5th April 2027, the grantee must submit the required information before 6th October 2027. There is no requirement to submit through an online service that does not yet exist.
For rights newly granted on or after 6th April 2027, the normal period is 60 calendar days. A report can also be required within 60 days when an earlier right is assigned, or when a written variation changes reportable information. Once a recorded right ends, expires or is exercised, the grantee must tell the registry within 60 days.
A separate trap concerns notices and restrictions entered against a registered title. Where a relevant application is made, the necessary contractual control information must generally already have been provided at that stage. HM Land Registry may refuse an entry until the requirement is met, so this is a title-protection and transaction-timing issue, not just future publication of a dataset.
What information will the Land Registry collect?
The grantee, usually the developer or promoter holding the right, is responsible for the disclosure. Regulation 7 generally requires a personally regulated conveyancer to submit it through the Land Registry’s digital channels, subject to limited statutory waiver powers. Merely involving an unregulated member of a law firm’s support staff does not satisfy that definition.
Information includes the parties, type of right, contract date, dates and conditions governing exercise, the land’s registered title, duration and extension provisions. If the grantor is an individual, date and place of birth are also requested. Those personal birth details will not appear in the public dataset.
Where an option affects only part of a registered title, the location must be identifiable. HM Land Registry has said conventional scanned PDF plans will not meet the spatial-data requirement for that digital submission. Surveyors and conveyancers can prepare suitable geospatial files, including GeoJSON or Shapefile, or use mapping tools expected in the service.
HM Land Registry plans to publish a searchable contractual control dataset from April 2028, updated at least monthly. That is different from the date when reporting begins. Landowners and promoters need to distinguish the information collected privately from what the eventual public database will disclose.
Why planning professionals should read it
Why does this matter to planning professionals? An option can influence when land is put forward for allocation, whether a proposed housing site is deliverable and who controls negotiations over infrastructure or sale. Greater transparency may help communities and local authorities understand some of those relationships, but the new dataset will not replace proper evidence of availability or viability.
The information duty is also distinct from the civil law governing agreements and from the planning system. Holding an option does not make a development lawful, while permission does not make an option contract enforceable. Our restrictive covenants and planning permission guide explains another example of how private land rights and planning consent remain separate questions.
HM Land Registry put the practical point succinctly in its 26th October announcement: “Reading the guide now will help conveyancers identify affected transactions and advise clients early.” I would extend that message to promoters and planning advisers dealing with site options today.
For contractual control agreements already granted since 8th June 2026, review the contract and its extensions, identify the title and affected land, and ask the conveyancer whether it meets the statutory tests. For new transactions, retain the signed documents and commission usable digital boundary information where only part of a title is affected.
The immediate news is a more detailed official guide, not a new planning consent regime. The legislation is made but is not yet in force. It applies to England and Wales, not Scotland or Northern Ireland, and the first submission deadlines are in 2027.
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