Service charge

needhouseadvice

I've finally got a demand for service charge after being at my place for a few months. How do I check it's legit? Seems a bit weird to just hand over my cash to a random solicitor I've never heard of until now.

flashg67

It will be in your deeds, but not perhaps who you pay it to. Not a legal answer I know, but ask a neighbour maybe? If not, I'd say you;re within your rights to ask for proof that the solicitor is authorised or whatever to collect the payments.
Presumably it's on behalf of the leaseholder - can you contact them direct to check?

da_rule

What's the service charge for? Are you a tenant? Do you own a property leasehold or freehold?

When we bought a new house we paid our first service charge to the solicitor representing the developer as they had not at that point appointed the management company.

needhouseadvice

da_rule wrote: »

What's the service charge for? Are you a tenant? Do you own a property leasehold or freehold?

When we bought a new house we paid our first service charge to the solicitor representing the developer as they had not at that point appointed the management company.

I own it leasehold. I Googled the address and it looks like the management company and solicitor has the same address.

da_rule

Did you see the leasehold information pack that your solicitor had when you purchased the property? This should contain details of who the management company is.

You could either ask for it from your solicitor or just contact the freeholder and check that the person who has contacted you is the management company.

needhouseadvice

da_rule wrote: »

Did you see the leasehold information pack that your solicitor had when you purchased the property? This should contain details of who the management company is.

You could either ask for it from your solicitor or just contact the freeholder and check that the person who has contacted you is the management company.

Aha! Good idea. Thanks!

needhouseadvice

I seem to remember the management company only has an address. No phone no. I've tried Googling them before. Are they usually this hard to reach?

da_rule

It would depend I guess. If they are at the same address as the solicitors, you could always try calling them?

For the freeholder, you'll probably only have an address.

tim123456789

needhouseadvice wrote: »

I seem to remember the management company only has an address. No phone no. I've tried Googling them before. Are they usually this hard to reach?

Yes

They are frequently one man a dog operations who have bought the "ground rent" investment and try to do as little work as possible for their buck.

Of course this may not be true in your case

how big is the block you live in

AFF8879

Strange that the demand for payment is coming from a solicitor. Normally if you buy a flat you'll pay any accrued service charge to your solicitor along with the other funds - which will then get passed to the management company - but after that the mgmt co will just invoice you directly each period.

Is this a new build / is there no management company in place to represent the freeholder?

eddddy

Whilst you were buying the flat, your solicitor should have sent you a copy of the Leasehold Information Form.

This should contain details of the Managing Agent contracted by the Freeholder.


If it's the Law Society's standard version of the form (TA7), it will be in section 4.