I only have Fifty years remaining on my lease in Ewloe. I need to extend my lease but my freeholder is absent. What are my options?

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 for permission 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 prove that you or your lawyers have used your best endeavours to track down the landlord. On the whole a specialist may be helpful to try and locate and prepare a report to be accepted by the court as proof that the landlord is indeed missing. It is wise to seek advice from a conveyancer in relation to investigating the landlord’s absence and the vesting order request to the County Court covering Ewloe.

Expecting to complete next month on a leasehold property in Ewloe. Conveyancing solicitors inform me that they are sending me a report within the next couple of days. What should I be looking out for?

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

• You should receive a copy of the lease

I own a leasehold house in Ewloe. Conveyancing and Norwich and Peterborough Building Society mortgage organised. I have received a letter from someone saying they have taken over the reversionary interest in the property. It included a ground rent demand for rent dating back to 1994. The conveyancing practitioner in Ewloe who acted for me is not around.What should I do?

The first thing you should do is make enquiries of the Land Registry to be sure that this person is indeed the registered owner of the freehold reversion. You do not need to incur the fees of a Ewloe conveyancing solicitor to do this as you can do this on the Land Registry website for £3. Rest assured that regardless, even if this is the rightful landlord, under the Limitation Act 1980 no more than 6 years of rent can be collected.

I am a negotiator for a busy estate agency in Ewloe where we see a few leasehold sales jeopardised as a result of short leases. I have been given contradictory information from local Ewloe conveyancing solicitors. Could you confirm whether the owner of a flat can initiate the lease extension process for the purchaser on completion of the sale?

Provided that 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. The benefit of this is that the buyer can avoid having to sit tight for 2 years for a lease extension. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment has to be done prior to, 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.

What makes a Ewloe lease unmortgageable?

There is nothing unique about leasehold conveyancing in Ewloe. All leases are unique and drafting errors can result in certain provisions are wrong. For example, if your lease is missing any of the following, it could be defective:

• A provision to repair to or maintain elements of the premises
• A duty to insure the building
• Clauses dealing with recovering service charges for expenditure on the building or common parts.
• Maintenance charge proportions which don’t add up to the correct percentage

You may encounter difficulties when selling your property if you have a defective lease as they can affect a potential buyer’s ability to obtain a mortgage. Accord Mortgages Ltd, Skipton Building Society, and Bank of Ireland all have express conveyancing instructions when it comes to what is expected in a lease. Where a lender has been advised by their lawyers that the lease is defective they may refuse to grant the mortgage, forcing the purchaser to withdraw.

I am the registered owner of a ground floor flat in Ewloe, conveyancing having been completed 2011. Can you shed any light on how much the price could be for a 90 year extension to my lease? Equivalent properties in Ewloe with over 90 years remaining are worth £225,000. The average or mid-range amount of ground rent is £55 invoiced annually. The lease ends on 21st October 2087

With 63 years unexpired we estimate the premium for your lease extension to be between £18,100 and £20,800 plus professional fees.

The figure that we have given is a general guide to costs for extending a lease, but we cannot give you the actual costs in the absence of detailed investigations. You should not use this information in a Notice of Claim or as an informal offer. There are no doubt other issues that need to be considered and you obviously should be as accurate as possible in your negotiations. You should not take any other action based on this information before seeking the advice of a professional.

Other Topics

Lease Extensions in Ewloe