Having checked my lease I have discovered that there are only Fifty years unexpired on my flat in Crook. I now wish to get lease extension but my freeholder is absent. What options are available to me?

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 enable the lease to be lengthened by the magistrate. However, you will be required to prove that you or your lawyers have made all reasonable attempts to track down the freeholder. On the whole an enquiry agent would be helpful to try and locate and to produce a report to be used as proof that the landlord is indeed missing. It is wise to seek advice from a property lawyer both on proving the landlord’s absence and the vesting order request to the County Court covering Crook.

You should [be sent a copy of the lease|receive a copy of the lease]

I am hoping to sign contracts shortly on a garden flat in Crook. Conveyancing solicitors have said that they will have a report out to me on Monday. What should I be looking out for?

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

• Does the lease prevent you from renting out the flat, or working from home
• An explanation as to the provision in the lease to pay service charges - with regard to both the building, and the more general rights a leaseholder has
• You should have a good understanding of the insurance provisions
• Changes to the flat (alterations and additions)
• Whether the landlord has obligations to ensure rights of quiet enjoyment over your property and do you know what it means in practice?
• What the implications are if you breach a clause of your lease?

For details of the information to be contained in your report on your leasehold property in Crook please enquire of your conveyancer in ahead of your conveyancing in Crook

I own a leasehold flat in Crook. Conveyancing and National Westminster Bank mortgage organised. A letter has just been received from someone claiming to own the reversionary interest in the property. It included a demand for arrears of ground rent dating back to 1998. The conveyancing practitioner in Crook who acted for me is not around.Do I pay?

First contact the Land Registry to make sure that the individual purporting to own the freehold is indeed the new freeholder. It is not necessary to instruct a Crook conveyancing practitioner to do this as it can be done on-line for less than a fiver. Rest assured that regardless, even if this is the rightful freeholder, under the Limitation Act 1980 the limitation period for recovery of ground rent is six years.

I am a negotiator for a busy estate agency in Crook where we have experienced a few leasehold sales derailed as a result of short leases. I have been given inconsistent advice from local Crook conveyancing solicitors. Could you shed some light as to whether the seller of a flat can initiate the lease extension process 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 start the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. The benefit of this is that the buyer can avoid having 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.

An alternative approach is 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.

Completion in due on our sale of a £ 200000 maisonette in Crook in just under a week. The freeholder has quoted £<Macro 'feeRangeWithVAT'> for Landlord’s certificate, building insurance schedule and previous years service charge statements. Is the landlord entitled to charge such fees for a leasehold conveyance in Crook?

For most leasehold sales in Crook conveyancing will involve, questions about the management of a building inevitably needing to be answered directly by the freeholder or its agent, this includes :

• Answering pre-exchange enquiries
• Where consent is required before sale in Crook
• Copies of the building insurance and schedule
• Deeds of covenant upon sale
• Registering of the assignment of the change of lessee after a sale

Your lawyer will have no control over the level of the charges for this information but the average costs for the information for Crook leasehold premises is £350. For Crook conveyancing transactions it is customary for the seller to pay for these costs. The landlord or their agents are under no legal obligation to answer such questions most will be willing to do so - albeit often at exorbitant prices where the fees bear little relation to the work involved. Unfortunately there is no law that requires fixed charges for administrative tasks. Neither is there any legal time frame by which they are required to supply the information.

Crook Conveyancing for Leasehold Flats - Examples of Questions you should consider before Purchasing

Where a Crook lease has no more than 80 years it will impact the salability of the apartment. Check with your mortgage company that they are happy with the length of the lease. Leases with less than 80 years remaining means that you will most likely need a lease extension sooner rather than later and it is worth finding out how much this would cost. For most Crooklease extensions you will need to own the premises for a couple of years before you are eligible to exercise a lease extension. How is the lease structured?