Leasehold - Can you extend/add things?

Feanor

Hi all,

Went to see a maisonette tonight, over 800 years left on lease, ground rent about £10 a year so all good.

I asked about putting patio doors in to open up access onto the garden and the lady said shes not sure if your allowed to do that, but she wasn't sure. I have rang the agents to see if they can find out for us as thats the only thing keeping us from making an offer to be honest. The agent said things like patio doors should be fine, but not sure about extending or putting on a conservatory. The conservatory would probably be the one we would go for, rather than an extension as such..

Does anyone know if generally management companies are ok with this? Or can give me any information about it.

Thankyou.

Feanor

does anyone know?

We are having such difficulty trying to decide on a house in a not so good area, or a maisonette in a better area...hmph

Richard_Webster

The only way to find out is to look at the lease and see what it says about alterations and extensions etc.

It is most likely that it will say that consent is needed for an alteration.

Some landlords will charge for the consent and will charge a lot more for retrospective consent after you have done the work because they know you have little choice.

The legal position may be interesting but in the real world doesn't have much to do with anything - even if there is a good legal argument for saying that the wording of the lease isn't wide enough to catch what you are proposing, when you come to sell the proeprty your buyer's solr will take a cautious view and your landlord almost certainly will!

As an example, I had a case recently where some guy built a load of maisonettes in the 1960s with 999 year leases and a very small ground rent - so little in it for him on a continuing basis. He died and the family sold the freehold to some property company who sent someone to wander round the estate and they noticed all the contraventions and my client got a letter out of the blue asking for £650 to give consent for some patio doors which had replaced a window. These had been put in long before my client purchased but she was still stuck. When selling it was necessary to produce the consent but we didn't want to be seen to be arguing with the landlord, which might have put a buyer off. I think it wasn't necessary to tell the buyer how much our client paid for the consent. If we had made a fuss it would have been a dispute with the landlord which would had to be revealed in the Property Information Forms.

The moral for you is to find out who the landlord is and their likely attitude - a local solr may know of the landlord and may be able to give you some clue or at least find out. The old guy who used to own the freehold in the case I mentioned probably wouldn't have bothered too much and might not have charged, or only £25 or something like that. But there are some awful rip off landlords...

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.

JennyW_2

we purchased our flat last year and there were things we wanted to do which were not covered in the lease, ie removal of existing back door & window and replace with french doors, relocate bathroom, new kitchen etc. We gained permission via the landlord and this was incorporated into our lease. Of course you'll need to find out before you start going down the buying process and if permission is granted, let your solicitor know so that he can liaise with your landlords solicitor.