Lease problems - can land lord do this?

beefster

I help run a small village cricket club which leases its ground from the local council. I recieved a letter from them today, addressed to the trustee's of the club, requesting £3458 in rent they forgot to charge for over the past 6 years!

Letter reads,

""I have looked into the lease and it provides for rent of £4100 subject to annual review in line with the retail price index. I have however noted that there has been an oversight and revised rents have not been levied. Set out below are rent that should have been levied.

Rent from rent underpayment
1997 £4100
1998 £4243 **
1999 £4298 **
2000 £4439 £339
2001 £4512 £412
2002 £4580 £480
2003 £4701 £601
2004 £4843 £743
2005 £4983 £883

Total £3458

** rent not demanded for 6 years is not payable.""

Our lease actually says the rent is "£4100 REVIEWABLE annually in an upward direction only to changes in the retail price index"

My view, although obviously biased, is that "reviewed" is not the same as "subject to" and means they CAN increase in line with the RPI but dont have too?
We are going to contest this as we do not have this kind of money sloshing around in the club and will struggle to be able to pay it.

Any help would be most welcome.
Thanks for looking.

beefster

Whilst that would be a lovely notion we have practice facilities paid for by the lottery, a club house, changing rooms and scoreboards etc all built ourselves over the past 50 years. Re-location is not an option....... and they know it!

Like the leathal weapon line tho!

Ian_W

I'm no lawyer beefster, but I somehow doubt the p1ss-taker who wrote the letter for the council is either. Though I may be wrong there, once knew a local authority solicitor who I wouldn't have trusted to buy a dog licence but as I was in opposition I thought he was ever such a nice man.

An annual review does what it says on the tin, it reviews it annually. They have dropped a gooley [or should it be googly!] by not reviewing your rent each year. IMO they can't suddenly remember and go back and do it retrospectively for 8 years. The key word to me is "REVIEWABLE", had it said "INCREASED annually" and they had simply forgotten to do it, then I don't think you'd have a [square] leg to stand on.
As worded I personally think they're stumped if they persue it. Most CC's I've ever belonged to have a lawyer somewhere in membership, if so get him [better still if it's a maiden, her] to write back and threaten to whip their bails off if they don't run along.

BoL.

Al_Mac

I'm with Ian W, they haven't followed what it says.

It should have been reviewed, it wasn't. If it had been reviewed you should have been informed of the outcome, you were not.

If push came to shove, I reckon it would go in your favour.

Good luck.

:beer:

beefster

Thanks for all the replies. Are there any legal eagles out there in money tips land who might now anything about the legalties of this sort of thing?

rozeepozee

Contract law is not my forte, but what the earleir posters say is likely to be correct. There are something called implied terms in contracts (i.e. not everything mecessarily has to be written down). If you haven't already done so check whether your lease specifies a timescale in which the annual review can be made. If it doesn't then I would venture that the annual review must be done within a reasonable timescale (???one or two months). As others have already said, I suspect that an annual review is just that, something that must be done annually, not six years down the line when your absent minded landlord remembers. I would challenge this demand and if they don't back down, get some legal advice. BOL

Dora_the_Explorer_5

I'm not a legal eagle but do work in the community. I would suggest you get your local councillors, both parish/town/district on board asap, using the magic words 'social inclusion' 'increasing social capital in the village and wider community' 'healthy living' 'communality' 'local sporting initiative' 'making links with other communities' 'sporting opportunity for all sections of the community' and all the other stuff we wisely put in funding bids. I do understand that you are not making a funding bid! And of course it's worth making your councillors understand what a long and wonderful self supporting the cricket club has which has freed off council funding to support other sporting initiatives. Also point out the loss to the community if the club closed, nowhere for grannies to send grandpas on sleep saturday afternoons, making it even more difficult for older people to participate in health, sporting activities!
My guess is that the lowest worker on the totem pole wrote the letter and of course, review does not mean 'increase the rent'. Hope this helps.

Me_Myself_2

I'm with all of the above, they haven't followed what it says and won't have a leg to stand on if you challenge it.

It states "reviewed annually" and by the passage of time from one year to another, it is reasonable to assume that they decided not to increase the rent. Therefore in law they cannot backdate this - It won't stand up in court.

I think you could also argue that this year's increase should only be at RPI rate based on the £4100 as that is the current rent.

Good luck. Let us know.

beefster

Pleasing to hear that my bias was not blinding me to believe simply what i would like to be the case. Thanks for all of your input.

I am drafting a letter today to say we wont be paying and any future increase will only be acceptable at £4100 plus the RPI.

Come on England )

Dora_the_Explorer_5

Good luck - hit 'em for six. If the council is 'cabinet' style it might be worth contacting the cabinet member with responsibility for culture, sports and the arts, this is the kind of thing they should interest themselves in and be interested in. If your council has an elected mayor, contact them about it. Hope this helps.
I've had a re-read of the letter you received, and frankly it's written in such poor english it doesn't even make sense !

BobProperty

I'm agreeing in general with other posts that I think they can't backdate the rent rise. Check if the lease contains details of the notice they need to give of the rent increase. My main point though, is ask around the club members and see if someone is or has connections to a solicitor, local authority contacts etc. You may be lucky and find that a club member is a solicitor, or related to one and you could get someone involved and dedicated to your side for nothing.