buying flat- incorrect info given on lease!!

amigasara

Hi,
I hope someone can help me with some advice.

I'm in the process of buying my first flat. The EA informed me the lease is 100y when I viewed the place and again verbally when I made my offer.
Got the mortgage offer through :T and my solicitor is pushing for exchange. She now contacted that she found out that the lease is only 90y and that she will have to inform my lender of this.
As she said this might not be a problem to the lender at all as 90y is still a long lease.

During my viewings I let go of a flat that had an 82y lease as I thought that if I come to sell in 8-10y time this would not be so attractive to potential buyers.
Now I can be in the same situation. I might have to spend money on the lease extension before being able to sell it.

What do I do? Do I go back to the EA and reduce my offer now? Do I insist that the vendor should extend the lease up to 100y or 99y?
Could this be an honest mistake or was the vendor/or EA using the 100y to get more interest in the place? :mad:

many thanks.

Sara

Premier_2

Leases tend to be 99 years or 999 years when originally set up.

Perhaps yours was 100 years when set up (which is not normal, but could apply) and now it's 10 years into it, it has 90 years remaining. It doesn't affect the value of the property in any way.

You cannot rely on what the EA tells you - there will be a disclaimer about that.

If you are not happy with 90 years remaining, you could ask the vendor to get it extended - but I doubt they'll bother going to that expense. There's other buyers out there who won't be bothered by the fact it's only 90 years remaining.

If you are not happy with the deal - walk away, but you are unlikely to get a 99 or 100 year remaining term on a used property unless the lease has just been renewed, usually when there's about 65 years remaining) or its about 900 years old.
Note that when the lease is renewed/extended, it often comes coupled with a hefty increase in annual ground rent

lynzpower

Leases cann be way over 99 or 100 years, my old one was 125.

Was the HIP ordered when the property was first marketed.

It certainly seems to me that there should be a compliaint in the offing to the NAEA ( or whatever theyve been rebranded as - I forget) as this clearly comes under "property misdescriptions act"

amigasara

If you are not happy with 90 years remaining, you could ask the vendor to get it extended - but I doubt they'll bother going to that expense. There's other buyers out there who won't be bothered by the fact it's only 90 years remaining.

There might be that risk, but not sure in this market?

I left a message for the EA and hope to hear her response to this on Monday morning. :eek:
Many thanks for the replies!!! this site is great!!:beer: