Advice about my freehold offer please

jamez79

Hi,

I recently enquired about buying the freehold to my semi-detached two bedroom house. I sent a cheque for £120 off to the freehold people and they sent a valuer round who measured the rooms and width of the land. I have today received the figure....

They want £4,045 plus their clients legal fees of £350 and surveyor's costs of £375 both charges subject to VAT.

How do i check whether this is a reasonable price to pay? My parents recently (about 6 months ago) bought their freehold and it was only £2,150 plus fee's. Their house was built aound 1970 and is a 4 bedroom detached, with more land than our house and is valued at approx' £170,000 or more. I'm not too sure how long is left on their lease but it's not as long as mine.

Our house was built in 1974 and is valued at approx' £125,000 and has about 67 years left on the lease.

How on earth can it be more expensive than a bigger, older house?

If someone could give me some adivce on how i can check this price is correct or tell me how i go about bartering with them (in true money saving spirit) it would be greatly appreciated.

Kind regards,

James

cattie

These may be the best people to contact for advice http://www.lease-advice.org/newintro.htm

It's a government funded advice agency for residential leasehold properties.

goldbyron

This may sound stupid but I didn't realise there were leasehold houses - thought it was for flats. This sounds like a very reasonable price for a freehold - but then I only know about flats.

Debt_Free_Chick

As a quick rule of thumb, you could ask a local estate agent how much value it would add to the property.

Presumably, you'd claw back the outlay through lower maintenance costs and/or ground rent in the future?

jamez79

Hi,

Thanks for the advice. I'll get in touch with the Lease-advice.org people and see what they say. I'll update this thread with what they tell me so it may be of benefit for anyone else buying their freehold.

goldbyron - yes there's quite a few lease hold houses in my area of the midlands. Probably some fad the house building people went through. Most of the estate i live on is leasehold but slowly people are buying them up.

Thanks again all.

James

ffacoffipawb

goldbyron wrote:

This may sound stupid but I didn't realise there were leasehold houses - thought it was for flats. This sounds like a very reasonable price for a freehold - but then I only know about flats.

My house is leasehold, 999 year lease with 960 remaining.

The ground rent is £20 pa, fixed. No other lease outlay.

I was quoted £600 plus costs to buy this out. Approx £1,000.

Not worth it to save £20 per year!

My £1,000 earns about double that much in interest anyway!

Ian_W

ffacoffipawb wrote:

My house is leasehold, 999 year lease with 960 remaining.

The ground rent is £20 pa, fixed. No other lease outlay.

I was quoted £600 plus costs to buy this out. Approx £1,000.

Not worth it to save £20 per year!

My £1,000 earns about double that much in interest anyway!

Do watch out though - in 880 years they'll be able include the "marriage value" - then you'll be sorry. :rotfl:

jamez79

Hi,

I've contacted lease-advice.org to see if they can help.

Whilst i wait for a response, Are there any surveyors reading this post that could do a few sums to see if the figure i've been quoted is in the right area or not?

Will let you know what lease-advice say.

Regards

James

jamez79

Hi,

To keep anyone still reading this updated. I have spoken to a solicitor that deals with freehold purchases on a daily basis and whilst speaking with her she cam up with a calculated figure of approx £1600. Apparently I am being over quoted by the freeholders solicitors and this goes on quite often.

I have therefore asked for her to work on my behalf at negotiating this figure with the freeholder's solicitors. Even after costs etc i should save around £1000.

Will let you know what the final price is, but pls bear in mind this could take a few months.

Regards,

James

hedgehogpenguin

Best of luck , keep us posted.I'm going to be in exactly the same boat soon, but I think with a larger bill!!

musey

Please keep updating this thread. I am very interested in your progress/experiences as I would like to purchase the lease on one of our properties (we have approx 120 years to run)