Doubling Ground Rent every 25 years

[Deleted User]

Personally I wouldn't buy any Leasehold until I saw what came from any planned reforms, on the basis that I think it would be very hard to legally change an existing Lease / contract .


Another thing that worries me is never use the developers solicitors, they aren't on your side.

Tom99

BBH123 wrote: »

Personally I wouldn't buy any Leasehold until I saw what came from any planned reforms, on the basis that I think it would be very hard to legally change an existing Lease / contract .
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I may have missed it, but my reading of the consultation paper is that there are no plans to restrict what leases can be granted re ground rent and ground rent reviews, only to make it easier and maybe cheaper to extend the lease and reduce the rent to a peppercorn.

araki

Tom99 wrote: »

I may have missed it, but my reading of the consultation paper is that there are no plans to restrict what leases can be granted re ground rent and ground rent reviews, only to make it easier and maybe cheaper to extend the lease and reduce the rent to a peppercorn.

I have joined the group and everyone is telling me to walk away. Even taking away the ground rent, I am reading horror stories about leasholds. The development is over a commercial property, and I have been told that we can't even have Right To Manage because of this. Maybe it is just better to wait and try to hold the fort for a freehold. I felt reassured by you, but the whole problem seem to to lie with the leashold problem. The solicitor is dishonest, the agents are dishonests, and I will have to deal with them probably for as long as I will have the flat, fighting constantly. I might reconsider the whole leashold thing.

itwasntme001

I own a leasehold flat in a conversion in London. I also own a share in the freehold as well. I have had no issues with it whatsoever. GR is nil as well and the length is well in excess of 120 years.


I used to own another leasehold flat which but no share in freehold. The lease length was less then 90 years and ground rent was £300 doubling every 25 years. But this wasnt a problem. It was the freeholder who did not care about the building and was completely unresponsive that was the problem. So i sold at the height of the market and mvoed into my current place which i can not see myself selling and moving out of ever.


To the OP - leaseholds are very much hit and miss. A lot can be discovered during the conveynacing process but you need to have a good conveyancer and also make sure a valuation is done including valuing any potential lease extension (incl cost of reducing GR to nil).


Personally i would never buy a new build (overpriced and service charges tend to be a huge rip off plus build quality usually not good at all). I would also try to make sure a share in the freehold is included although not deal breaker. The main thing would be to make sure the building is managed properly and costs are reasonable.


The "high" GR on the lease i would not say is a deal breaker as long as its factored in your purchase price. But i would be wary of the other points i just raised.

[Deleted User]

I think it's a good idea to walk away.

Leases on new builds are generally worse than on old properties because builders/ Freeholders have woken up to how much money can be made from them. There's a reason why Freehold dare included in big company pension investments.

Share of Freehold or Freehold is the way to go which gives you control .