help..what is happening here?

Curry_Queen

Glad things seem to be getting sorted out but one thing you could do if you get any more callers asking to view the property is to tell them that it's inconvenient for you to allow anyone to enter the property at that particular time due to a member of your family having a highly infectious illness/disease ... then ask for their contact details so you can arrange a suitable time when you get the all clear from the doctor! This way you can verify their details with the estate agent to find out if they're genuinely mistaken or whether something more sinister is going on

starlite_2

he he..yes we thought of something like that. perhaps letting them in and showing them around then saying that we need to get back to the estate agents for auditing reasons just to let them know that they had turned upo for the viewing,,and getting their names that way..but then now we know the agents don't actually have our place listed it seems like that wouldnt help

EdInvestor

imported_ami wrote:

we bought our flat around 4 years ago, and extended the lease to 100 years as part of our offer..all has been fine but we are now having problems with the leaseholder. he has asked us many times when we plan to sell...

...we are in a block of converted flats, he owns the two flats below us and the three to the left side, along with one flat on the right, and has the lease to the full building..

Hi imported_ami,

Blocks of converted flats are normally organised like this:

There is a freeholder (sometimes a company, sometimes an individual) who owns the building itself. He is also sometimes called the "landlord".

The freeholder grants long term leases of 99+ years on the flats within the building and these leases can be purchased for loadsmoney by individuals like you.You are one of the leaseholders. You will have bought the flat from an earlier leaseholder (not from the freeholder)UNLESS the freeholder was also the owner of a number of the flats, if so, he would be both a leaseholder and a freeholder at the same time.

Leaseholders normally pay a small amount of money per year to rent the ground the building sits on. This "ground rent" is paid to the freeholder or to the management company he has appointed to look after the building. The leaseholders also usually pay a service charge for repairs and maintenance of the building and insurance of it.This can be quite a large amount in the thousands of pounds per annum.Who are you paying this money to, in particular the insurance?

Now it's possible for a leaseholder of a flat also to be landlord, if the leaseholder rents his flat out on a comparatively short-term basis to tenants.Such tenants will pay rent to the leaseholder/landlord but will not pay ground rent, or service charge or insurance, which are the responsiblity of the leaseholder landlord to pay to the freeholder landlord.

Your explanation above sounds like a weird kind of combination of the two.

Did you perhaps rent the flat first on a short term basis and then buy it?

Sorry if I've got the wrong end of the stick but you could have a problem here if you've mixed the two up which needs attention.