Management company need to agree to sale?

love2learn

About to buy a new build, have signed nothing.

One of the clauses in the contract is that the management company who manage the estate need to release a certificate to approve the sale of the house I'm buying if I want to sell it in the future.

The house builder (1 person, independent builder) is also the director of the management company.

Would this be normal if buying a new build of a big developer like Taylor Wimpey, Barratt etc? Sounds really dodgy if they can stop a house sale going completely through.

libf

I only have to get permission from Barratt from any external alterations to the property. Not for a sale.

LJS2014

I had to pay the Management company a fee to provide the "Seller's Information Pack" to the solicitor for the sale of my new build flat but I didn't require their approval for me to sell.

stator

Read the terms and conditions of the agreement with the management company. Usually it says "Not to be unreasonably witheld". That should stop them from objecting to the sale on spurious grounds. It's mainly to stop you selling if you haven't paid all your management fees up to date.
Having a management company involved does put off some buyers, as it's just another additional cost in buying that no-body needs.

AlexMac

This sounds odd so before deciding, I'd be asking this '1 person' what ransom, sorry, I mean fee, will apply over an above any usual charges for providing freeholder or management responses to furture pre-purchase enquiries. I'd assume that permission "cannot reasonably be witheld", but you're going to need to commit to legal fees to get a solicitor to get binding answers so it seems fishy. I've not heard of this, but I did buy a flat once and failed to realise til we sold it that the solicitor who drew up the lease in the 1990's had slipped in a clause thay they had to provide a meaningless but costly bit of paper in any future sale transaction; even if they were not otherwise involved (i.e. not acting for buyer or seller!). A sneaky little earner for no effort as there were 13 flats in the block and on average one or two sold every year.

But then, when it comes to solicitors, developers, managing agents etc I'm so cynical that I sometimes think they do anything to make a profit rather than act out of a sense of benign charitable altruism!

Richard_Webster

OK please try and follow this as it is a bit complicated. I assume we are talking about houses rather than flats.

There's probably a pribvate road or a play area or some other feature that the Management Company will have to look after and collect money for this from the houseowners. Is that the case?

If so the reason for the need for consent is that consent will be given if a buyer signs a deed of covennat to pay the management fees.

A Lessor/landlord can make a lessee (typically of a flat)m pay sercide charges etc simply by reason of the llessor/lesse relationship and neither lessor nor lessee have to be the original parties to the lease.

Not the same with freholds I'm afraid. If you as freehold owner of a house agreed to pay a regular charge to a management company this is not binding on successors, so they need to make sure they sign a deedof covenant and they do this by inserting a provision at the Land Registry that transfers are not be registered without the management company's consnet - which it will give if it gets the deed of covenant.

If you ask your solicitor to explain it will prbably be along the lines I've set out above.