A scenario to get your teeth into

Minkybob

Hi All

I mainly lurk here bar posting on the have a look at this thread and would have posted this here at the time but I’m interested in the boards opinions;

Back in May when I was house hunting I went to see this flat;

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-51315709.html

It was in disrepair which I was aware of but it was a lot cheaper than others I had seen (allowing for the expense of doing it up) and had a nice big (for London) garden!

There were other issues for example;

• the kitchen was in a corridor
• the bathroom appeared to be in a shed
• there was no proper ceiling in the shed/bathroom
• the shed looked very DIY on the outside
• an aroma of damp

What did put me off was being told about the lease situation 57 years remain and the freeholder is absentee and from the sounds of it had been for some time.

Which leads me to my question;

In what situation would anyone buy this flat? Would it just be left to rot away in the ownership of the leaseholder?


PS I notice rightmove says it’s no longer available, from cursory searches it doesn’t appear to have been sold.

G_M

It'll turn up in an auction shortly.

AdrianC

Minkybob wrote: »

Would it just be left to rot away in the ownership of the leaseholder?

The leaseholder is going to want to get shot. One way or another, they will. It's still a perfectly habitable property in London, so it WILL sell. The question is how much it'll sell for.

And, if ever you're unsure how much something's worth but you definitely want to sell, then the answer is simple - auction.

csgohan4

ouch the price of a 4 bedroom where I live.

Auction you might find a bargain, but it's always buyer beware, there maybe more that needs fixing internally

ap1985

I would try check sites which list auctions in London....

OR you could just move out of London and try get a house for that price

Minkybob

csgohan4 wrote: »

ouch the price of a 4 bedroom where I live.

Auction you might find a bargain, but it's always buyer beware, there maybe more that needs fixing internally

Yes it just seemed to me not really a great investment and not something to take on if you only want somewhere to live.

eddddy

Minkybob wrote: »

In what situation would anyone buy this flat? Would it just be left to rot away in the ownership of the leaseholder?

I don't think it would rot away.

A cash buyer could buy it. It the upstairs leaseholder was willing, an RTM company could be formed to manage the property, or they could apply to the court to buy the freehold.

Or if the upstairs leaseholder wasn't interested, the lease could still be extended, and the flat refurbed. (But there may be ongoing arguments about maintenance costs.)

In this case, I'd guess the upstairs leaseholder would be fairly cooperative, as their flat upstairs looks reasonably well maintained: http://www.zoopla.co.uk/property-history/96b-cecil-road/harrow/ha3-5rb/31115577


But obviously, the price of the flat needs to be right to account for all the costs and hassle involved.

HouseBuyer77

Yes it just seemed to me not really a great investment and not something to take on if you only want somewhere to live.

Let's say you bought it at auction for £10'000 and then spent £40'000 on getting it up to a decent standard and started renting it out. Wouldn't take many years til you'd made back your investment and then everything from that point forward would be profit (minus ongoing costs etc). After 10 years you'd have made a good return on your investment and still have an interest generating investment. You wouldn't care about the lease running out by the time it does you would have made plenty of money.

Of course it'll go for far more than that, as above there are ways and means to sort out the lease situation. But it's just an example of how the right price will make any property very attractive to the right buyer (in this case an experienced LL with experience in rennovations and deep pockets to finance the purchase and rennovation project).

Cakeguts

Looks expensive to me for a 57 year lease and Wealdstone. I would have been surprised if you could sell a 2 bed flat for that in Wealdstone with a 120 year lease.