I only have 68 years unexpired on my lease in Aylestone. I now want to get lease extension but my freeholder is can not be found. What are my options?

If you qualify, under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 you can apply to the County Court for for permission to dispense with the service of the initial notice. This will mean that your lease can be lengthened by the magistrate. However, you will be required to demonstrate that you or your lawyers have used your best endeavours to find the landlord. In some cases a specialist may be useful to try and locate and to produce an expert document which can be accepted by the court as evidence that the landlord is indeed missing. It is advisable to get professional help from a conveyancer both on proving the landlord’s disappearance and the application to the County Court overseeing Aylestone.

I am hoping to sign contracts shortly on a leasehold property in Aylestone. Conveyancing lawyers inform me that they are sending me a report within the next couple of days. Are there areas in the report that I should be focusing on?

Your report on title for your leasehold conveyancing in Aylestone should include some of the following:

• You should receive a copy of the lease

Last month I purchased a leasehold flat in Aylestone. Am I liable to pay service charges for periods before my ownership?

In a situation where the service charge has already been demanded from the previous lessee and they have not paid you would not usually be personally liable for the arrears. However, your landlord may still be able to take action to forfeit the lease. A critical element of leasehold conveyancing for your conveyancer to be sure to have an up to date clear service charge receipt before completion of your purchase. If you have a mortgage this is likely to be a requirement of your lender.

If you purchase part way through an accounting year you may be liable for charges not yet demanded even if they relate to a period prior to your purchase. In such circumstances your conveyancer would normally arrange for the seller to set aside some money to cover their part of the period (usually called a service charge retention).

I work for a busy estate agent office in Aylestone where we have experienced a few leasehold sales put at risk due to leases having less than 80 years remaining. I have been given inconsistent advice from local Aylestone conveyancing solicitors. Please can you clarify whether the seller of a flat can instigate the lease extension formalities for the buyer?

As long as the seller has been the owner for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to commence the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. This means that the proposed purchaser need not have to sit tight for 2 years to extend their lease. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment needs to be completed before, or at the same time as completion of the sale.

Alternatively, it may be possible to extend the lease informally by agreement with the landlord either before or after the sale. If you are informally negotiating there are no rules and so you cannot insist on the landlord agreeing to grant an extension or transferring the benefit of an agreement to the buyer.

What makes a Aylestone lease defective?

There is nothing unique about leasehold conveyancing in Aylestone. Most leases are unique and drafting errors can result in certain provisions are not included. For example, if your lease is missing any of the following, it could be defective:

• Repairing obligations to or maintain parts of the property
• Insurance obligations
• Clauses dealing with recovering service charges for expenditure on the building or common parts.
• Service charge per centages that don't add up correctly leaving a shortfall

A defective lease can cause issues when trying to sell a property as they can affect a potential buyer’s ability to obtain a mortgage. Birmingham Midshires, The Mortgage Works, and Barclays Direct all have express conveyancing instructions when it comes to what is expected in a lease. If a mortgage lender believes that the lease does not cover certain provisions they may refuse to provide security, forcing the purchaser to withdraw.

Aylestone Leasehold Conveyancing - Sample of Queries before buying

What is the yearly maintenance fee and ground rent? Does the lease have more than 85 years left? Are any of leasehold owners in dispute over their service charge payments?

Other Topics

Lease Extensions in Aylestone