Freeholder refusing permission

Riq

Do not buy and then hope to renegotiate, you'll be stuck if you cant come to an agreement.

Doozergirl

Jebrelli wrote: »

I spent last night thinking it through and my initial thoughts are:

- the company is probably money-grabbing enough to accept a small premium (and high ground rent) for extending the lease to 99 years
The company by their record is clearly money-grabbing enough to want a high premium and a high ground rent. They will understand the difficulties and costs that leaseholders face going to the LVT and that it's them that hold the cards.

- once the lease is extended, after 2 years I could exercise my right for a statutory extension; giving me a much longer lease and peppercorn ground rent (hopefully only paying a small cost for the extension)
You're not going to extend it twice? That's both pointless and expensive. You pay the freeholder's legal fees as well as your own each time. 99 total will years will suffice, it's no major deal but it's a clear shot across the bough to show you exactly how profitable they know their business can be.
- no property is perfect, particularly not leaseholds (and that's pretty much all there is down here), and I've already given up one sale because of the management company's records
Good. It's a bit of a minefield but I'd be looking for share of freehold, or small blocks where self management is a possibility, or simply somewhere where the freeholder is smaller and less likely to take advantage.
- why would any other properties out there be better than this?
Because they just are. There are plenty out there better than this. I'm a freeholder myself, I don't enjoy it, the leaseholders are a PITA and they give me sleepless nights as well, but I'd never dream of charging £900 and upping ground rent for the simple removal of a wall. I know this isn't your issue to deal with right now, so you think it's not something to worry about, but I can guarantee you that it will finish no better than it started.
Maybe I'm just letting my attachment to the flat cloud my judgement, but I can't see any reason not to make an offer to extend the lease.
At least please get it negotiated and assigned to you by this vendor.hey know exactly what they're doing by trying to up the ground rent before properly negotiating the lease extension. An offer only stands for so long.

replies in blue!

Out of interest, what sort of value of property are we looking at that costs £18,000 to extend for 29 years?

Would you do me a favour and knock on a couple of doors and ask some other residents about the freeholder/managing agent? Your vendor will be loathe to tell you any significant truths.

Ulfar

Run away from this you are just going to end up with lots of stress and expense.

What the vendor and other leaseholder should have done way before now is buy the freehold.

Jebrelli

Doozergirl wrote: »

replies in blue!

Out of interest, what sort of value of property are we looking at that costs £18,000 to extend for 29 years?

Would you do me a favour and knock on a couple of doors and ask some other residents about the freeholder/managing agent? Your vendor will be loathe to tell you any significant truths.

Thanks all. I've been thinking through the options over the weekend as I'd like to give a response to the seller's solicitors by tomorrow.

Obviously the best option for me is to eliminate the company's involvement entirely, so I'm now considering making a private offer for the freehold.

I know the chances are fairly slim that the company will go for it, but it may be that a lump sum of cash right now is preferable to fighting us through an LVT (plus the company bought the freehold only a couple of years ago for about £1,000).

Doozergirl - the property is £260,000. I'd like to speak to the neighbours, but there's only one and I'm not sure I want the seller to know I've been knocking on doors!

Ulfar

Just to let you know they can say no in the first two years and there is nothing you can do about it. One way round this is to get the vendor to begin the process and then hand it off to you, your solicitor will be able to explain the pitfalls if they are any good.

There are also lots of exclusions in the rights to buy a freehold, one of the big ones seems to be there are lots of rules where it is a house split into two flats.

I hope your flat isn't one of these because if it is at the very minimum is the other owner must agree to buy their share of the freehold as you need agreement from two thirds of the leaseholders.

This is a very tricky situation and has lots of legal techinicalities.

If the current owner is Peverel, Solitaire or estate management they will not want to sell you the freehold as they will have bought it with the intention of making money from managing the properties.

I would want all of this sorted before exchanging any contracts.

Swans1912

Ouch! We have shared parking spaces and this is too much for us! This flat must be amazing to be worth all this hassle and I hope you work it out as clearly you have your heart set on it!

I would personally run... Life is to complex to have to worry about these kind of things.

Jebrelli

So, a bit of an update.

Yesterday I put forward two offers for the seller to make to the freehold company - one to extend the lease, the other to purchase the freehold outright.

Today the seller's solicitor replied with the original lease offer (£18,000 to extend to 99 years) made by the company last year. They said they won't approach the company with our offer as there is already an offer on the table.

They also think it is inappropriate of me to try to negotiate "at this late stage".

How can I persuade them to put the offers forward?

Thanks for any suggestions - I'm taking everything on board.

CloudCuckooLand

Threaten to walk away. It is the seller who will then be stuck with sorting it all out properly...

sooz

So the only offer you have for increasing the lease costs you nearly £1000 (more once you factor their legal fees in) per year for each extra year on the lease. And you only get back up to 99 years! :eek:

Who are the freeholders?

Jebrelli

CloudCuckooLand wrote: »

Threaten to walk away. It is the seller who will then be stuck with sorting it all out properly...

Thanks, you're right. I've just drafted an email to my solicitor saying that the seller must renegotiate the deal, otherwise I'll withdraw.