Freeholder breaching lease?

AlexMac

I wandered away when typing my initial reply; which addressed a dishwasher plumbing leak, not your remark about rain which I've just seen;  so look at my postscript.   I originally said

"One of the joys of leasehold flats eh, ElieseKM? 

It's happened to me a couple of times in past leasehold flats; once, like yours from a flexi-hose feed to a washer or dishwasher, the other from a failed upstairs shower seal. Thankfully both relatively trivial; a matter of litres, not hundreds of gallons, so relatively cheap to fix (there was a third incident in another flat in the block involving thousands of gallons and thousands of pounds of damage caused by three weeks leakage into an empty flat but I only got involved in that as I acted as Treasurer for and managed the Buildings Insurance for our shared freehold company.  We chose not to use an idle or incompetent Managing Agent like yours, but to manage and maintain ourselves, so it was done proper!  Hence my preference for shared freeholds)

Your Freeholder's office or managing agent are obviously not going to help so you're on you own, regrettably. 

Usually, that's what insurance is for, so you could either 
1 - ask the adjacent Commercial Unit to cover the costs and/or claim on their insurance policy
2 - involve your Contents Insurer; either to settle the claim, or to fight it out with next door's; especially if you've added legal cover to your policy.

But in practice, and as the damage sounds thankfully, minor rather than catastrophic, you could just suck it up (not literally!) fix and pay for it yourself; especially if you have a couple of hundred pounds insurance excess.  

Insurance companies vary; in my case, when my helpful upstairs neighbour tried 1- a claim on my behalf, their insurer AXA wriggled out of it on grounds that it wasn't "negligence"!  Neighbours bunged me £200 from their own pocket, bless 'em.  AVIVA however were amazingly helpful on the really big claim involving two properties; sorted the lot, including appointing contactors!

So give it a try; who knows; the Commercial neighbour might do the honourable thing?"

But, now you move on to say
"there has been a leak in the same place four times since I have moved in. I think it happens when there is rain in a certain direction..."

That's  much more serious, so I would involve my insurer to find out why it's happening, as it won't fix isself?

canaldumidi

I've read the thead three times and still am unclear what the issue is. What exactly is it that is leaking and/or exactly what damage has been done?

What repair is needed?

Liability is also unclear.  "It does say in the lease that the freeholder is responsible for fixing this"  'This' is unspecified (see my comment above) and  vague reference to the lease is insufficient- please quote in full the relevant clause(s) in the lease.

ElieseKM

The freeholder has changed part way through my ownership, with one of the leaks the first two times was with the old freeholder (the original developer) who came out and said they repaired the roof and painted the wall where there was water damage, they tried to do something with the floor but it didn’t improve the water stain. It’s happened twice with the new freeholder and they haven’t done anything, the water damage is still on the wall and the floor is now significantly worse. The other leak happened under the most recent freeholder and again nothing has been done but so far this one doesn’t seem to be recurrent.

I am dealing with a management company although the agent isn’t answering any emails until I chase via phone and the. Says she is working on it but nothing is happening. I have thought of referring this managing company to the property ombudsman due to lack of response and other issues we’ve had in the block regarding fire safety and security which were not resolved in a timely manner.

eddddy

AlexMac said:

But in practice, and as the damage sounds thankfully, minor rather than catastrophic, you could just suck it up (not literally!) fix and pay for it yourself; especially if you have a couple of hundred pounds insurance excess.  

It's a flat. It's damage to 'buildings'. It's very likely to be the freeholder's buildings insurance policy.

The excess is likely to be thousands for 'escape of water', not hundreds.

AlexMac said:

But, now you move on to say
"there has been a leak in the same place four times since I have moved in. I think it happens when there is rain in a certain direction..."

That's  much more serious, so I would involve my insurer to find out why it's happening, as it won't fix isself?

(Again, it's probably the freeholder's insurers.)

It's very, very unlikely that the rainwater leak is the result of an incident which is an insured risk.

But if there was an incident,  it would be for the claimant to tell the insurer what the incident was. For example, 

• A storm blew part of the roof off on 12th May
• A tree fell over and damaged the roof on 30th April

But it's much more likely to be poor workmanship and/or wear and tear - which won't be covered by buildings insurance.

ElieseKM

canaldumidi said:

I've read the thead three times and still am unclear what the issue is. What exactly is it that is leaking and/or exactly what damage has been done?

What repair is needed?

Liability is also unclear.  "It does say in the lease that the freeholder is responsible for fixing this"  'This' is unspecified (see my comment above) and  vague reference to the lease is insufficient- please quote in full the relevant clause(s) in the lease.

Apologies if I have not been clear. There has been three leaks:

1. A leak along a wall (approx 5m x 2m) adjacent to a commercial unit which had mains water leak running over night, they say the water damage in my property couldn’t have anything to do with them despite it being an adjacent wall to them. I have no internal pipe work along my wall, I checked my water pressure to ensure it was nothing to do with my underfloor heating and that was all fine too. My lease states the freeholder should resolve any disputes between tenants, however they will not do anything. I have reported my concern that water is trapped under the building due to the volume of water that leaked through the night, the structure of the groundwork is kind of like a tray (I have checked this with the developer and there is no drain away) so potentially is still there. I have also noticed that my upload flooring has cracked in places and is creaking when walked on which it didn’t previously so I’m not sure if water is evaporating when I put on my underfloor heating. Again no response on this. Repair needed is to my wall and skirting, also I would like confirmation the water is not trapped.

2. Water penetrating through above the skirting board on an external wall, I reported this and nothing has been done. Repair needed is to the water damage on the wall, also I would like confirmation of why this has happened.

3. Leak above my patio doors, this has occurred four times. Repair needed is to my wall and floor where both are water damaged. I would also liken the root of the problem established.

eddddy

ElieseKM said:

The freeholder has changed part way through my ownership, with one of the leaks the first two times was with the old freeholder (the original developer) who came out and said they repaired the roof and painted the wall where there was water damage, they tried to do something with the floor but it didn’t improve the water stain. It’s happened twice with the new freeholder and they haven’t done anything, the water damage is still on the wall and the floor is now significantly worse. The other leak happened under the most recent freeholder and again nothing has been done but so far this one doesn’t seem to be recurrent.

OK - more new information.

The freeholder attempted a repair, but it wasn't successful.

• So perhaps the freeholder was negligent - they picked an incompetent roofer, or they told the roofer to do the wrong thing

• Or perhaps the roofer was negligent for doing a bad job 

So you might have a claim against the freeholder for negligence or breach of lease, or you might have a claim against the roofer for negligence.


You might find this kind of stuff confusing, but it's probably the kind of detail you'll need to go into.


This isn't the kind of problem that The Property Ombudsman deals with. If your managing agent gave poor service - like they failed to reply to your letters - they might award you £100 for the inconvenience, and tell the managing agent to apologise. They won't get involved with the repairs.

sidneyvic

It obviously needs sorting so claim on your home insurance and let them chase the responsible parties. You may also have free legal with your home insurance and if so make use of it, a letter from a solicitor to the freeholder could work wonders.