Extend Your Lease guide discussion

GTG

The section 42 notice to the freeholder is valid from the day it is served so need to worry about your extension not completing before your lease is below 80 years. The valuation will be based on this date. From there onwards there are provisions in law to ensure a timely progression of the transaction. A competent solicitor will sort it all out for you.

Okrib

I've been through this process, and also work in property.


The best piece of advice I can offer anyone is do not attempt to do any lease extension outside of the act. Use the legislation that is there to help and protect you. Some of the things I have read here frighten me immensely - not getting the statutory 90 years but rather topped up to 99, with ground rent increasing etc.


Serve the Section 42 if you've owned it for 2 years, and go through the process. It will absolutely save you money.

Dallybally

Hi. I noticed on the article it stated about a property "It will be virtually unmortgageable under 60", and figured that it wasn't worth looking at a place which had 58 years.

I was just looking at a mortgage criteria for something else and noticed this lender would take 55 years at the start of a mortgage as long as there were 25 left at the end.

Did a bit of digging and although some lenders require 60, 70 and even 99 years, there are many lenders that will go below 60. I think 50 is where it would be "virtually unmortgageable" and to put that at 60 in the article is a bit misleading. "Harder to get under 60" would be more appropriate.

Or maybe it's just me.... Just throwing my thought in.

Cheers.

doraappa

Hi

We are planning to buy a flat which has 81 years of lease left. We asked owner to extend the lease. They requested the freeholder management company via informal route. The freeholder management company gave a quote with premium and terms which we agreed (we are paying for extension) and asked the owner solicitor to proceed accordingly.

The issue is the freeholder management company is taking ages to draft a lease extensions document and this is the only thing which is dragging our home buying process (to get to an exchange state) quite slow which is frustrating.

My question is, is there any legal time limit we (our sellers solicitors) can force the leasehold management company to comeback with a lease extension document after the premium has been agreed by all parties? Its been more than a month we have been waiting extensively for the same document and its driving me crazy.

Please advice

many thanks

Dora

julialease

Make sure what ever you do you read the lease, if the rent doubles every 10 years the premium you would have to pay the freehold would be massive.

liam1989

Good afternoon all,
I can't believe it's been almost 4 years since I was asking for advice on this site regarding extending my lease on my flat. That is all but a distant memory now (I extended it back in 2013)....... however, I've since had a letter from my solicitor to say that the freeholder's solicitor’s have been in touch to see whether I want to purchase the freehold.

I just have a quick question. I paid a rather large amount of money to extend my lease to 170 years. When I read my solicitor's email I was rather annoyed with some of his wording like 'it would be in your best interest to buy it' and ' you don't want it falling into the wrong hands'.

Say for example I didn't buy my freehold, what could potentially happen? I mean I negotiated new terms on the extended lease, paid the premium and the fees and signed the new contract. Can the new freeholder impose new terms, charge service charges etc
I'm just struggling to see why I should need to buy the freehold. The only positive I see is the value of my property will potentially rise by 1%.

Your advice and assistance will be very much appreciated
Thanks

Shenl0101

None worth pursuing if you already have 170 years left on the lease and you are happy with the management of the property.

Dallybally

Hi. From what I gathered from the article on here about buying your freehold, once you own it you and the other freeholders have to arrange the maintenance and gather the appropriate service charge.

Although freeholders always give a breakdown of where service charge is spent, it's not in their interest to get you the best deal. If they have a friend who's in the building trade, or own a maintenance company themselves, what's to stop them paying massively over the odds?

Although it might be a hassle to sort out, especially if there are many freeholders to share with, you might find your service charge goes down massively if you arrange it yourself as freeholder.

Also, I'm surprised it only increases the value by 1%. I own a few properties and I would always go for a freehold over a leasehold. Perhaps technically you gain 1% but you might find you're much more likely to get the asking price or it sells quicker.

However given that you've just gone to the expense of extending lease this seems like very bad timing.

daztraction

I currently live in a block of four, and have 91 years left on my lease. I'm looking to move out of my current flat in 3-5 years time. Is it worth extending the lease now? I'm looking at £2,000 plus expenses on a £103K flat, according to the calculator.

ognum

London_Lease_Extensions wrote: »

Replying to:

daztraction I currently live in a block of four, and have 91 years left on my lease. I'm looking to move out of my current flat in 3-5 years time. Is it worth extending the lease now? I'm looking at £2,000 plus expenses on a £103K flat, according to the calculator.

It may impact the marketability of your flat. If you extend your lease it's one less thing for the new buyer to think about, hence putting you in a stronger position.

Is this a service you provide?