Extend Your Lease guide discussion

propertyman wrote: »

You make a pedantic distinction for your own satisfaction;:eek:
have another easter egg...

The costs that are recoverable and are reasonable are all the landlord's costs.....a landlord that seeks costs that they cannot reclaim is another issue and abuse.

The vast majority if cases result in reasonable costs being levied and not being challenged or having to be determined. A cost of £2 to £4k is commonly seen and factors into the decision of whether to negotiate.

Get over yourself. You were making a misleading and inaccurate generalisation and not for the first time (sigh). Sorry if it upsets you to have that pointed out to you.

NormW wrote: »

Right, a year later and I've decided I must pull my head out of the sand, I've got about 58years left now.

The guide says step 1 is to find a solicitor so that's me totally stuck before I start. I do not know of one who I would trust to do this. Can anyone recommend someone reputable? I've made poor choices in the past so don't want to repeat this mistake.

Thinking ahead I'm probably looking somewhere around the £20k for the lease extension I'd reckon (property value around 80k). I doubt I can approach my mortgage lender as the result would be an 100% mortgage, again the guide says not to use loans but I don't see I have any other option? This is the main reason I've held off, I don't have savings or equity in the property to use to finance the lease extension.

this is exactly the same boat i think i will be in. i 'think' ill have enough for the premium to extend the lease, however the 'fees' part i think i will struggle with.

the options are remortage (will not happen as i borrowed too much as it is), loan (just paid off my loan and i dont really want another one), ask to borrow money off parents (nope, pride at stake) or just carrying on saving until i can afford it (even though the unexpired lease will continue to dwindle and cause the price to increase.

NormW wrote: »

I've got about 58years left now.

The guide says step 1 is to find a solicitor so that's me totally stuck before I start. I do not know of one who I would trust to do this. Can anyone recommend someone reputable? I've made poor choices in the past so don't want to repeat this mistake.

There are companies and solicitors on the internet who claim to specialise in this. I don't know how good they are but they ought to know what they're doing.

My ex-freeholder was a crook, also an estate agent. He delayed and blocked for years. When I started the LVT process, he tried to charge me for a "valuation" he carried out 5 months after he had sent his counter-notice. His "expert report" to the LVT said my house was single glazed, although it's fully double glazed. He took me to the small claims court because I wouldn't pay for his valuation. At court, the judge told him that LVT matters cannot be heard in court, only at the LVT.

Then (to the LVT) he claimed the counter notice was just a preliminary step to his valuation. (even though his counter-notice contained his counter-offer and was sent 5 months before his valuation) He even tried to claim for his taxi fares to the LVT hearings ! I'm surprised he didn't claim for £2 for a lunchtime sandwich ! Then he claimed that my initial notice was invalid because (he claimed) it didn't include a plan. I showed the LVT that all the copies had plans attached and showed that the FH had signed for letters by recorded delivery, which he had then claimed not to have received. The LVT didn't believe him. I offered £9K - He wanted £32K - The LVT ruled £16K.

He was a member of the RICS, I complained to them - they fully supported him. No surprise, there !

Anyway, enough about my LVT experiences, which are now behind me. Yippee !

When I went through this, in about 2000, you needed to have a professional valuation done for you for the initial notice, FH then does his valuation, and within two months must send a counter-offer. You are (or were) liable for FH's reasonable costs from service of the initial notice, up to the date of application for the LVT hearing. So, you pay FH's valuation cost (provided it's professionally carried out and invoiced for.) You could, at that time, represent yourself at the LVT.

NormW, If you have no money or savings, it's hard to know how you're going to pay for this, but IMO, it's better to bite the bullet and get on with it.

mart.vader wrote: »

There are companies and solicitors on the internet who claim to specialise in this. I don't know how good they are but they ought to know what they're doing.

<snipped some bits out for readability>

When I went through this, in about 2000, you needed to have a professional valuation done for you for the initial notice, FH then does his valuation, and within two months must send a counter-offer. You are (or were) liable for FH's reasonable costs from service of the initial notice, up to the date of application for the LVT hearing. So, you pay FH's valuation cost (provided it's professionally carried out and invoiced for.) You could, at that time, represent yourself at the LVT.

NormW, If you have no money or savings, it's hard to know how you're going to pay for this, but IMO, it's better to bite the bullet and get on with it.

That's the thing, I've gone through well known legal firms in the past with good reputations but all often isn't as it seems to be.

Right, so I need to work out how much it'll cost to serve the notice, pay for my valuation and the freeholders+their reasonable costs and find that cash first before I can even find out how much the lease extension is? I don't like the wording of "reasonable costs" as who decides what is reasonable? Either way I'll guess at £3k to get that far so that identifies my first two hurdles of:

1. Find a solicitor who really does know what they are doing and who clearly understands they have someone who despite a load of reading is still pretty confused by the process so they have to take the lead 100%.

2. Find 3k-ish, which will take me over a year to save that kind of cash.

partialycloudy wrote: »

We took out a personal loan for ours, we had no choice.

<snipped a load out again to keep this shorter>

So please for your own sanity and peace of mind just get it done or you will always be thinking about!

I've looked at personal loans and if you take £20,000 over 5 years the repayments are £400pcm. We'll starve or be bankrupt as there's no way we can afford that each month...

I think my sanity and peace of mind will be a lot worse if I get a loan out to extend the lease and put us on the brink of financial ruin!

My only hope here is if there is some equity in the property I can release to reduce the loan amount, I guess I'll find that out when we get the valuation done but I know current value is only £20k more than the mortgage and that's without a short lease. Doubt mortgage lender will let us go 100% mortgaged and the rate would be high anyway.

I guess another avenue is to sell to a cash buyer at reduced price and hope it covers the remainder of our mortgage. Then as we'd have no deposit we'd have to go into rented/council accomodation and be back to square 1 so to be honest after this experience I'd not bother buying another property again.

My father recently died. He had a flat which was rented out. We began looking into selling it. Rang an estate agents who asked what the lease was. Don't know, I'll find out. Couldn't find any paperwork so went to the land registry and for £3 downloaded the lease. Bummer, it said 99 year lease starting in 1979. We thought he had extended it. Is it possible that he extended it but the extension never made it to the land registry? Has anyone experienced that?

Thanks in advance.