Leasehold house - would you buy?

seashore22

Simple question, I hope. Apart from the issues of having to pay ground rent and possibly service charges, are there any other problems when buying a leasehold house? For instance is it as easy to get a mortgage on this sort of property and would resale be more difficult?

bryanb

999year lease-Yes
99year lease-No

seashore22

Thanks for that. Not sure about lease length and I will check that, but it is a fairly new development and would suspect that lease is long.

TrickyDicky101

If it's new, I would definitely check the details on Ground Rent. I have no experience of leasehold houses, but some leasehold apartments I have seen have GR which
1) is set high to begin with
2) doubles after every 10 years
This would stop me dead from buying and would likely do the same for future purchasers.

seashore22

I'm asking on behalf of someone else, but my instincts are the same as yours Tricky. However I didn't want to be negative without having some other views and a better idea of the real issues.

lfc321

As above, it all depends on the details of the lease. In some parts of the country leasehold houses are the norm and by excluding them from consideration you'd be narrowing down your choice of houses considerably. We live in one such area. But our lease has something like 800 years left and the ground rent is something like £2 per year (was fixed when the house was built in 1906 and doesn't go up).

Edited to add: no problem in principle with getting a mortgage provided the legalities of the lease are all OK. Other probs include that you have to ask the leaseholder for permission to make some kinds of alteration to the house - again, whether that's a problem depends on who the leaseholder is and what the details of the lease are.

seashore22

According to the estate agent the property is being changed from leasehold to freehold, so we will see.

Richard_Webster

In some parts of the country builders still seem to be selling houses with 99 year lease so they can derive a further income form selling the freehold to some dubious property company that will then find ways of charging admin fees for various things and in 20-30 years time will demand a large sum to sell the freehold when some poor soul realises they can't sell their house because of the shortness of the lease.

The builders are preying on gullible buyers and this is deplorable.

999 year lease is better (particularly if house older and ground rent minimal) but property companies still buy up freeholds cheaply in the hope of catching a few lessees with outrageous admin charges for e.g. approving an extension.

tizerbelle

seashore22 wrote: »

According to the estate agent the property is being changed from leasehold to freehold, so we will see.

Until you see it in black and white and it has been confirmed by your solicitor that you are buying a freehold property, what the EA says means nothing.

lfc321 wrote: »

the ground rent is something like £2 per year.

Ooh that's expensive. Mine is £1.14 per year

seashore22

tizerbelle - they definitely won't be taking the estate agents word for it, but it does mean that the house is worth a viewing. They were thinking of cancelling the appointment if it was a leasehold property.

wymondham

Can't see why someone would buy a leasehold house when there are plenty of freehold ones around?