Frank (my husband) and I may need to let out our New Rossington ground floor flat temporarily due to a career opportunity. We instructed a New Rossington conveyancing firm in 2002 but they have since shut and we did not have the foresight to seek any guidance as to whether the lease prohibits the subletting of the flat. How do we find out?

Notwithstanding that your last New Rossington conveyancing lawyer is no longer available you can check your lease to check if it allows you to sublet the premises. The accepted inference is that if the lease is silent, subletting is allowed. There may be a precondition that you need to obtain permission via your landlord or some other party before subletting. The net result is that you cannot sublet without prior permission. Such consent must not not be unreasonably refused ore delayed. If your lease prohibits you from letting out the property you will need to ask your landlord if they are willing to waive this restriction.

I am attracted to a two flats in New Rossington both have in the region of fifty years remaining on the leases. should I be concerned?

There is no doubt about it. A leasehold flat in New Rossington is a deteriorating asset as a result of the shortening lease. The nearer the lease gets to its expiry date, the more it reduces the salability of the premises. The majority of buyers and lenders, leases with less than eighty years become less and less marketable. On a more positive note, leaseholders can extend their leases by serving a Section 42 Notice. One stipulation is that they must have owned the premises for two years (unlike a Section 13 notice for purchasing the freehold, when leaseholders can participate from day one of ownership). When successful, they will have the right to an extension of 90 years to the current term and ground rent is effectively reduced to zero. Before moving forward with a purchase of a residence with a short lease term remaining you should talk to a solicitor specialising in lease extensions and leasehold enfranchisement. We are are happy to put you in touch with New Rossington conveyancing experts who will explain the options available to you during an initial telephone conversation free of charge. A more straightforward and quicker method of extending would be to contact your landlord directly and sound him out on the prospect of extending the lease You may find he or she is happy to negotiate informally and willing to consider your offer straight off, without having to involve anyone else. This will save you time and money and it could help you reach a lower price on the lease. You need to ensure that any new terms represent good long-term value compared with the standard benefits of the Section 42 Notice and that onerous clauses are not inserted into any redrafting of the lease.

I've recently bought a leasehold property in New Rossington. Do I have any liability for service charges relating to a period prior to completion of my purchase?

In a situation 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. However, 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 a negotiator for a busy estate agent office in New Rossington where we have experienced a number of flat sales put at risk due to leases having less than 80 years remaining. I have received contradictory information from local New Rossington conveyancing solicitors. Please can you shed some light as to whether the owner of a flat can initiate the lease extension formalities for the purchaser on completion of the sale?

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 has to be done before, or at the same time as completion of the disposal of the property.

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 the sale of our £450000 flat in New Rossington next Wednesday . The managing agents has quoted £408 for Certificate of Compliance, building insurance schedule and 3 years statements of service charge. Is it legal for a freeholder to charge exorbitant fees for a flat conveyance in New Rossington?

New Rossington conveyancing on leasehold apartments usually involves the purchaser’s solicitor sending enquiries for the landlord to answer. Although the landlord is not legally bound to respond to such questions most will be content to do so. They are entitled levy a reasonable administration fee for responding to questions or supplying documentation. There is no upper cap for such fees. The average costs for the paperwork that you are referring to is £350, in some situations it is in excess of £800. The management information fee invoiced by the landlord must be sent together with a synopsis of entitlements and obligations in respect of administration charges, without which the charge is not strictly payable. Reality however dictates that you have no option but to pay whatever is requested of you if you want to sell the property.

New Rossington Leasehold Conveyancing - Examples of Queries Prior to buying

You should be aware that where the lease has no more than 80 years it will affect the value of the property. Check with your mortgage company that they are willing to lend given the lease term. A short lease means that you will most likely require a lease extension at some point and you need to have some idea of how much this would cost. For most New Rossingtonlease extensions you would be be obliged to have been the owner of the premises for 24 months before you are entitled to carry out a lease extension. Who is in charge of the block? The majority of New Rossington leasehold apartments will incur a service bill for the upkeep of the building levied on behalf of the landlord. Where you buy the apartment you will have to pay this amount, usually quarterly accross the year. This can be anything from several hundred pounds to thousands of pounds for bigger purpose-built blocks. There will also be a rentcharge for you to pay annual, ordinarily this is not a exorbitant figure, say approximately £50-£100 but you should to enquire it because on occasion it could be surprisingly expensive.

Other Topics

Lease Extensions in New Rossington