Leasehold clauses - where do i stand?

Lilmissdaydreamer

Im was looking at converting my 1 bedroom ground floor apartment into a two bedroom poroperty. It requires no external structure changes or internal supporting walls to be moved. What it does mean is that the bathroom would be relocted, and a stud wall will be moved. plumbing is just a case of feeding it through the new stud wall and the waste pipe for the only house above us runs down the inside of our property so we can just feed it into the main waste pipe.

Trouble is the lease says "No structual changes can be made to the property."

Is it worth asking the owner of the freehold if he was provided with all the information like plans etc, if he would be willing to make an exception? The work is actually minimal, and there are only 4 apartments in our block, who we know would be fine with the noise it might take (and we schedueled it would take a few weeks).

Any advice would be great- i havnt a clue about the legal side of things, and im hitting my head against a wall with our management company!

Thanks

Amanda

sooz

Lilmissdaydreamer wrote: »

Im was looking at converting my 1 bedroom ground floor apartment into a two bedroom poroperty. It requires no external structure changes or internal supporting walls. What it does mean is that the bathroom would be relocted, and a stud wall will be moved. plumbing is just a case of feeding it through the new stud wall and the waste pipe for the only house above us runs down the inside of our property so we can just feed it into the main waste pipe.

Trouble is the lease says "No structual changes can be made to the property."

Is it worth asking the owner of the freehold if he was provided with all the information like plans etc, if he would be willing to make an exception? The work is actually minimal, and there are only 4 apartment in our block who we know and are fine with the noise it might take (and we schedueled it would take a few weeks).

Any advice would be great- i havnt a clue about the legal side of things, and im hitting my head against a wall with our management company!

Thanks

Amanda

It's not an exception - you MUST ask for permission, & get the answer in writing before you do any work.

Lilmissdaydreamer

sooz wrote: »

It's not an exception - you MUST ask for permission, & get the answer in writing before you do any work.

I will of course get permission before any work is done - but is it even worth asking them in the first place, am i likely to get permission even if my lease says no?

sooz

Lilmissdaydreamer wrote: »

I will of course get permission before any work is done - but is it even worth asking them in the first place, am i likely to get permission even if my lease says no?

It depends on the wording of your lease, & your freeholder. How do you plan to get permission without asking?

Lilmissdaydreamer

Well i wont will i ;o) - it just sounded like that from the way i worded it.

in the covenants to the tenant it says - not to make any structual alterations to the demised premises or to errect on the demised property or any part thereof any building or other structure (whether permanent or temporary) whatsoever.

im in the process of find out who the free holder is as information that i had when i bought the house is now incorrect.

"

sooz

Lilmissdaydreamer wrote: »

Well i wont will i ;o) - it just sounded like that from the way i worded it.

in the covenants to the tenant it says - not to make any structual alterations to the demised premises or to errect on the demised property or any part thereof any building or other structure (whether permanent or temporary) whatsoever.

im in the process of find out who the free holder is as information that i had when i bought the house is now incorrect.

"

Oh dear. Are your management company one of the notoriously difficult ones too?

IMO, what you plan is a structural alteration. Whilst you might not be removing structural walls, you are changing the layout of your flat (thereby changing the means of escape) & adding an extra bedroom.

Depending on how difficult your MA or freeholder want to be, they might not give you permission, or they may want a payment to allow you permission.

I personally wouldn't ask for an 'exception' or make reference to that clause in the lease. Write a nice letter, enclosing one plan, requesting permission. Then wait to see what their response is.

Lilmissdaydreamer

sooz wrote: »

Oh dear. Are your management company one of the notoriously difficult ones too?

IMO, what you plan is a structural alteration. Whilst you might not be removing structural walls, you are changing the layout of your flat (thereby changing the means of escape) & adding an extra bedroom.

Depending on how difficult your MA or freeholder want to be, they might not give you permission, or they may want a payment to allow you permission.

I personally wouldn't ask for an 'exception' or make reference to that clause in the lease. Write a nice letter, enclosing one plan, requesting permission. Then wait to see what their response is.

Will do - Thank you for your advice! Will get some detailed plans drawn up,

marcosscriven

It seems to me there are just too many cases like this - where 'professional' freeholders makes lives difficult for leaseholders, simply to extract money by any means possible.

There has been some improvements in the law (right to enfranchise, right to manage and so forth), but there's still a big problem if you have a situation where there's only two flats in the building, and the freeholder owns the other - in that case there's basically no way to enfranchise half the freehold, since you can only get exactly 50% of the leaseholders (i.e just you), and not OVER 50%.

Don't get me wrong - there are some freeholders out there trying to the right thing, by ensuring leaseholders don't remove supporting walls and so forth. I just have an issue with the ones that view the freehold purely as a revenue raising activity!