I only have Fifty years left on my flat in Dunnington. I need to get lease extension but my freeholder is can not be found. What should I do?

If you meet the appropriate requirements, under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 you can submit an application to the County Court for an order to dispense with the service of the initial notice. This will enable the lease to be granted an extra 90 years by the Court. You will be obliged to demonstrate that you have done all that could be expected to locate the landlord. In some cases a specialist may be helpful to carry out a search and to produce an expert document which can be accepted by the court as proof that the freeholder can not be located. It is advisable to get professional help from a property lawyer both on investigating the landlord’s absence and the application to the County Court covering Dunnington.

Back In 2000, I bought a leasehold house in Dunnington. Conveyancing and Platform Home Loans Ltd mortgage are in place. A letter has just been received from someone claiming to own the freehold. Attached was a demand for arrears of ground rent dating back to 1993. The conveyancing practitioner in Dunnington who acted for me is not around.Any advice?

The first thing you should do is make enquiries of HMLR to make sure that this person is indeed the registered owner of the freehold reversion. It is not necessary to incur the fees of a Dunnington conveyancing solicitor to do this as you can do this on the Land Registry website for a few pound. You should note that regardless, even if this is the legitimate freeholder, under the Limitation Act 1980 the limitation period for recovery of ground rent is six years.

I am looking at a couple of apartments in Dunnington both have about forty five years left on the lease term. should I be concerned?

There are plenty of short leases in Dunnington. The lease is a legal document that entitles you to use the premises for a prescribed time frame. As a lease shortens the marketability of the lease deteriorate and it becomes more expensive to acquire a lease extension. For this reason it is often a good idea to extend the lease term. More often than not it is difficulties arise selling premises with a short lease as mortgage companies may be unwilling to lend money on properties of this type. Lease extension can be a protracted process. We recommend you get professional help from a conveyancer and surveyor with experience in this field

Last month I purchased a leasehold property in Dunnington. Do I have any liability for service charges relating to a period prior to my ownership?

Where the service charge has already been demanded from the previous owner and they have not paid you would not usually be personally liable for the arrears. Strange as it may seem, your landlord may still be able to take action to forfeit the lease. It is an essential part of leasehold conveyancing for your conveyancer to ensure 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 am employed by a busy estate agency in Dunnington where we have experienced a few flat sales derailed as a result of short leases. I have been given contradictory information from local Dunnington conveyancing firms. Could you confirm whether the owner of a flat can commence the lease extension formalities for the purchaser on completion of the sale?

Provided that the seller has owned the lease for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to kick-start the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. The benefit of this is 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 has to be done prior to, or simultaneously with completion of the disposal of the property.

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.

Dunnington Conveyancing for Leasehold Flats - Sample of Questions you should consider before Purchasing

The answer will be helpful as a) areas can cause problems for the building as the common areas may start to deteriorate where maintenance are not paid for b) if the tenants have a dispute with the running of the building you will need to have full disclosure Many Dunnington leasehold apartments will incur a service bill for the upkeep of the building set on behalf of the management company. Where you acquire the apartment you will have to meet this amount, normally in instalments accross the year. This may differ from a few hundred pounds to thousands of pounds for bigger purpose-built blocks. In all likelihood there will be a rentcharge for you to pay yearly, ordinarily this is not a exorbitant figure, say about £50-£100 but you need to check as sometimes it could be many hundreds of pounds. How much is the ground rent and service charge?

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Lease Extensions in Dunnington