I have recently realised that I have Sixty One years remaining on my lease in Hadley Wood. I now wish to get lease extension 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 magistrate. However, you will be required to prove that you or your lawyers have used your best endeavours to find the landlord. In some cases a specialist may be helpful to try and locate and prepare a report to be accepted by the court as proof that the freeholder is indeed missing. It is advisable to get professional help from a conveyancer in relation to investigating the landlord’s disappearance and the vesting order request to the County Court overseeing Hadley Wood.

Looking forward to sign contracts shortly on a studio apartment in Hadley Wood. 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 Hadley Wood should include some of the following:

• Do you need to have carpet in the flat or are you allowed wood flooring?

Does the lease prevent you from subletting the property, or working from home

Whether your lease has a provision for a sinking fund?

Changes to the flat (alterations and additions)

The landlord’s obligations to repair and maintain the building. It is important that you know who is responsible for the repair and maintenance of every part of the building

Responsibility for repairing the window frames

What you can do if a neighbour breach a clause of their lease? For a comprehensive list of information to be contained in your report on your leasehold property in Hadley Wood please ask your solicitor in advance of your conveyancing in Hadley Wood

My wife and I purchased a leasehold house in Hadley Wood. Conveyancing and Godiva Mortgages Ltd mortgage are in place. I have received a letter from someone claiming to own the reversionary interest in the property. Attached was a demand for arrears of ground rent dating back to 1994. The conveyancing practitioner in Hadley Wood who acted for me is not around.Any advice?

The first thing you should do is contact HMLR to be sure that this person is indeed the registered owner of the freehold reversion. There is no need to incur the fees of a Hadley Wood conveyancing firm to do this as it can be done on-line for £3. Rest assured that in any event, even if this is the rightful landlord, under the Limitation Act 1980 the limitation period for recovery of ground rent is six years.

Last month I purchased a leasehold property in Hadley Wood. Do I have any liability for service charges relating to a period prior to completion of my purchase?

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. 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 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).

If all goes to plan we aim to complete the disposal of our £125000 flat in Hadley Wood in nine days. The freeholder has quoted £324 for Landlord’s certificate, insurance certificate and previous years statements of service charge. Is the landlord entitled to charge an administration fee for a leasehold conveyance in Hadley Wood?

For the majority of leasehold sales in Hadley Wood conveyancing will involve, queries regarding 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 Hadley Wood
• 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 conveyancer will have no control over the level of the charges for this information but the average costs for the information for Hadley Wood leasehold premises is £350. For Hadley Wood 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.

I am the proprietor of a basement flat in Hadley Wood. Given that I can not reach agreement with the freeholder, can the Leasehold valuation Tribunal determine the amount payable for a lease extension?

in cases where there is a missing freeholder or where there is dispute about the premium for a lease extension, under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 it is possible to make an application to the LVT to judgment on the amount due.

An example of a Lease Extension matter before the tribunal for a Hadley Wood flat is Flat 2 2 Netherfield Road in April 2010. The Tribunale held that premium payable for a 90 year extension to the existing Lease should be £7,705. This case affected 1 flat. The the unexpired residue of the current lease was 76 years.

Other Topics

Lease Extensions in Hadley Wood