Money Owed by Vendor on Service Charges

Melissa177

Hello,

Having offered advice to others (the usefulness of which I'll leave to others' judgement!), I now have a little problem of my own.

I moved into a new flat on Feb 2nd 2007. I own the leasehold, the freeholder is a Housing Association in SW London.

I bought the flat from a man who had sadly died - the father wanted a quick sale, and we hurried things along quickly.

The service charge account was in credit to the tune of £514. The vendor's solicitor requested that I pay the £514 to the vendor upon completion, and the account would then be in credit on the property until the end of October. I had proof the account was in credit, my solicitor and I agreed this was fine, and I paid him the money on completion.

So far, so good.

Then I received a letter last week from the HA saying "You owe us money, please pay us £122 to cover Feb and Mar's service charge". I rang the HA to ask if they had made a mistake - maybe they hadn't changed the names over or something? The HA said that my vendor (the father) had written to them and asked them to refund the £514 back to him, which they did. :eek: :eek:

So, now I am down £514.

I rang the vendors solicitor, who confirmed that the money was supposed to be mine. I rang my ex-conveyancer, who, having received their (hefty!) fees for the transaction, said that they'd look into it, but appear to be in no hurry to do so. Meanwhile, I am missing £514 pounds. I have told the HA that I will pay the £122 by the end of the month if they have not received it back from the vendor by that time.


Any ideas on the best way to reclaim my £514 quickly? I have just paid a heavy amount of money on stamp duty, deposit, etc, and would rather like my service charge account to be back in credit, or have the money in my account ASAP!

cattie

It's the HA that are at fault here as it's usual for any service/maintenance account in credit to be refunded by the buyers solictitor at the time of the purchase of the property, the amount being added to the buyer's completion statement

Surely they should know the official proceedure. They must have known this was a private leasehold property & not a tenanted one???

Have you tried contacting these people for advice? It's a government funded agency offering impartial help & advice regarding many issues to do with leasehold properties.
http://www.lease-advice.org/newintro.htm

Your solicitor should be writing a strongly worded letter to the HA I'd have thought.

Melissa177

Thanks - this is excellent information. I had assumed it was the vendor's fault, as the HA are claiming that the vendor wrote them a letter asking for the money to be refunded. The vendor was a nice elderly man from Glasgow, who I never met, but was very courteous and sent me a card upon my moving in - I couldn't think it would be him defrauding me.


I also assumed that there were three separate contracts here: mine with the vendor, mine with the HA, and the vendor's with the HA while he was in possession. Hence, I assumed that this argument should be between me and the vendor.

Richard_Webster

It's the HA that are at fault here as it's usual for any service/maintenance account in credit to be refunded by the buyers solictitor at the time of the purchase of the property, the amount being added to the buyer's completion statement

Basically that's certainly what you would expect but Hsg Assns can be a law unto themselves and they may not follow the normal rules! Some managing agents make a point of labouring the fact that they will NOT make refunds and it is up to the seller and buyer to sort out apportionments etc of rent and service charge. So I would suggest that the letters and statment from the HA need to be looked at carefully because possibly they may have put it the other way round and even said that they would make a refund!

I find from reading these poosts that I'm learning theings that can go wrong and it is all getting stored away in my memory for next time I act for somebody buying or selling where an HA is involved!

[As a conveyancing solicitor I believe the information given in the post to be useful but I accept no liability except to fee-paying clients/I]

Melissa177

I've given my former conveyancer a bit of a kick, and they've sent a request marked "URGENT" to the vendor's solicitor requesting that they pay the money back to the housing association immediately.

Hopefully will see some movement by the end of the week!

I took the view that my contract was with the HA, and the vendor had a contract with me, so it was my responsibility to chase the vendor. I do agree that the HA should have checked with the current owner, because the service charge account belongs to the flat, and not the individual I understand.

Let's see what happens...

cattie

Fingers crossed you soon receive a cheque. Be sure to keep us posted.