Freeholder not playing ball on garden transfer..

tizzle6560

Long story short - my neighbours that back on to our leasehold property asked to buy some of my garden land from me - around 10% of an 85ft garden. I agreed and we came to a price, my mortgage lender assessed the area in question and deemed it not to have any negative effect on the property value.

When neighbours approached my Freeholder to see if they would agree, they have requested 40% more than the price I agreed on, saying that their justification for charging such a premium is a 'perceived loss in overall value to the freehold'. Even though my mortgage lender has rebuffed this by saying it makes no difference to value at all. They have not come up with any other justification so far.

They are holding fast on this absurdly inflated amount to the point where they are going to receive a big bit of nothing, over a little bit of something as my neighbours do not have anything else to throw at this.. I get they have their commercial hat on, but it really is no skin off their nose whatsoever so cant understand why they are being so short sighted over it.

Any advice or suggestions would be great. Cheers

Browntoa

answers in the word "Freeholder" and the fact that you never owned the right to sell it


you may have pee'ed the freeholder off and prompted the inflated price


you cannot sell what is not yours

tizzle6560

Browntoa wrote: »

answers in the word "Freeholder" and the fact that you never owned the right to sell it


you may have pee'ed the freeholder off and prompted the inflated price


you cannot sell what is not yours

Agreed, and let me add what I have written above - the first the Freeholder knew about this, was when i contacted them just to say that my neighbours had made an enquiry with me about the option of buying the land.

When they asked me if I had discussed any price with them I said no, as we wanted to get the FH consent first, otherwise a waste of time discussing money.

After neighbours paid their £360 admin fees just to 'formally ask the question', Freeholder asked us to agree on a price first and then let them know. Neighbours therefore said that we had agreed on a price of £X, should the FH give consent.

I appreciate it is not mine to sell, hence why we seeked approval from the get go and all through the proper channels. But the FH is now just holding them to ransom and even said to me - 'we assess your neighbour's house is worth £XXX,000, they clearly have some more money for this?!

marksoton

I don't understand. You stand to gain nothing from this transaction.

tizzle6560

marksoton wrote: »

I don't understand. You stand to gain nothing from this transaction.

Misunderstood. I stand to gain £X that my neighbours and I agreed on should the FH give their consent.

The FH is asking for 40% more than the price my neighbours and I have agreed on.

TrickyDicky101

tizzle6560 wrote: »

Agreed, and let me add what I have written above - the first the Freeholder knew about this, was when i contacted them just to say that my neighbours had made an enquiry with me about the option of buying the land.

When they asked me if I had discussed any price with them I said no, as we wanted to get the FH consent first, otherwise a waste of time discussing money.

After neighbours paid their £360 admin fees just to 'formally ask the question', Freeholder asked us to agree on a price first and then let them know. Neighbours therefore said that we had agreed on a price of £X, should the FH give consent.

I appreciate it is not mine to sell, hence why we seeked approval from the get go and all through the proper channels. But the FH is now just holding them to ransom and even said to me - 'we assess your neighbour's house is worth £XXX,000, they clearly have some more money for this?!

And? It's theirs to sell. Up to them how much and how they conduct themselves. If you don't like it, buy a freehold next time.

Sorry if this sounds harsh but it's the reality.

AdrianC

I'm still not sure you quite get this. This is not YOUR land to sell. You can sell part of your lease to use it, but that will still require legals on the part of the freeholder - redrawing your lease, and drawing a new lease for your neighbour. He may very well not want to do that for such a small area - as is his right - so you seem to be expecting him to sell part of his freehold.

The freeholder has every right to ask whatever price he wants for that part of his land - and to decide it on whatever basis he likes, with a very few exclusions. It may well be a value you and your neighbour think prohibitively high. Hey ho, just means your neighbour won't be buying it, then...

Would you both have preferred a flat refusal to a figure you think too high?

G_M

Can we be clear:

* you are trying to sell your leasehold Title to (part of) the garden?
* you are not trying to sell the freehold Title (which as stated above is not yours to sell)?
* you require the freeholder's consent to a) divide your lease into two parts (1/2 the garden in each)? and b) to sell one part of these 2 leases?

I imagine this would indeed have some impact on the feehold's value, though without knowing the figures, I can't comment.

I can also imagine other factors that might disuade the freeholder, like the added complexity of managing the freehold with an additional leaseholder involved, seperate ground rents to collect etc.

If, on the other hand, it IS the freehold you are trying to sell (despite not owning it) then you're bonkers!

marksoton

tizzle6560 wrote: »

Misunderstood. I stand to gain £X that my neighbours and I agreed on should the FH give their consent.

The FH is asking for 40% more than the price my neighbours and I have agreed on.

Ok, well that's probably why the FH is after more then, they'll have figured out you're making money on property THEY own.

tizzle6560

AdrianC wrote: »

I'm still not sure you quite get this. This is not YOUR land to sell. You can sell part of your lease to use it, but that will still require legals on the part of the freeholder - redrawing your lease, and drawing a new lease for your neighbour. He may very well not want to do that for such a small area - as is his right - so you seem to be expecting him to sell part of his freehold.

The freeholder has every right to ask whatever price he wants for that part of his land - and to decide it on whatever basis he likes, with a very few exclusions. It may well be a value you and your neighbour think prohibitively high. Hey ho, just means your neighbour won't be buying it, then...

Would you both have preferred a flat refusal to a figure you think too high?

I appreciate all of this but - my neighbours have agreed to pay ALL parties legal and admin fees moving forward, the area of land in question has two derelict outbuilding on it anyway, so in actual fact my neighbours are doing everyone a favour in wanting to PAY to re-purpose this currently unusable bit of land.

And commercials aside, like I wrote in a previous post - the FH stands to gain something from a situation that actually benefits all parties. What skin is it really off their nose to just give consent. It is greed alone that has scuppered this deal as they are willing to sell but only for an amount they admitted to me was high to begin with.

tizzle6560

G_M wrote: »

Can we be clear:

* you are trying to sell your leasehold Title to (part of) the garden?
* you are not trying to sell the freehold Title (which as stated above is not yours to sell)?
* you require the freeholder's consent to a) divide your lease into two parts (1/2 the garden in each)? and b) to sell one part of these 2 leases?

I imagine this would indeed have some impact on the feehold's value, though without knowing the figures, I can't comment.

I can also imagine other factors that might disuade the freeholder, like the added complexity of managing the freehold with an additional leaseholder involved, seperate ground rents to collect etc.

If, on the other hand, it IS the freehold you are trying to sell (despite not owning it) then you're bonkers!

Correct on all points, other than me trying to sell the FH, so we are on the same page.

If my mortgage lender has deemed it to pose no risk to overall property value then surely the same can be said about the overall freehold value. Bearing in mind that the money I stand to gain from this will go back into landscaping the garden and generally improving the property to an even higher standard. So if anything, the FH value would increase.