Company offered me the chance to purchase my property freehold? What's your opinions? Should we buy?

eddddy

gazfocus said:

We are looking at houses at the moment and are instantly dismissing leasehold ones. 

Petriix said:

I'd personally never 'buy' a leasehold property. 

It's a small terraced house with a £2.50 ground rent, so I suspect the situation is as follows:

• Ground rent: £2.50 per year
• Lease length: probably around 850 to 900 years remaining
• Service charge: probably none (and the lease probably doesn't allow any)
• Freehold can be purchased for £1000 (or maybe less)

Why wouldn't you consider a property like that? (Assuming you're looking for a small terraced house.)

FrankFalcon

Some really helpful comments here.  I have thanked you all individually.  I never even gave it a thought that I could/should make them an 'offer' or 'negotiate' the price.  I am going to do exactly that after the weekend.  Why after the weekend? Because I'd be interested in your comments on how I should word my 'offer'.  The user above named knightstyle suggests offering £800 including fees, which is what I will probably offer.  Does 'including fees' include all legal fees? I just need to word it properly.
Thanks again for all your input guys

eddddy

FrankFalcon said:

We bought it 8 years ago for £50,000.  On Zoopla, a house a few doors down has recently sold for £10,000.  

How long is the lease?  What is the house currently worth? 

(In your post above, did you mean £10,000 or maybe £100,000?)

FrankFalcon

WOW! What a mistake to make.  

HOUSE IS WORTH OVER £100k NOT £10k  

Sorry guys

eddddy

FrankFalcon said:

WOW! What a mistake to make.  

HOUSE IS WORTH OVER £100k NOT £10k  

Sorry guys

How long is the lease? (It's very important to know that, to calculate a fair cost for the freehold.)

FrankFalcon

I will write to the agent and also to the leaseholder today, - Weds 8th Feb - (and ask for the remaining term on the lease) and hopefully come back with an answer after the weekend.

Thanks for your help.

eddddy

FrankFalcon said:

I will write to the agent and also to the leaseholder today,

I'm a bit confused.

8 years ago, you bought a leasehold house (therefore you are the leaseholder). 

You might have bought a lease for 30 years, 50 years, 100 years or 900 years (or any other number of years).

You seem to be saying that you don't know what you bought 8 years ago.

Which agent are you going to write to about this? Do you mean the estate agent you bought the house from 8 years ago?



The lease length will be stated in the documents you got when you bought 8 years ago.

If you can't find the documents from 8 years ago, you can download the title register from Land Registry for £3, and it will tell you the length of lease.

You can start a Land Registry search here: https://www.gov.uk/search-property-information-land-registry

FrankFalcon

Hi Edddy

Because I don't have the actual docs in front of me I can't remember the term remaining.  It appears I made a mistake in who I said I was going to write to.  

If I can't easily locate the docs it would probably be easier if I wrote to the author of the letter 'Pier' and also the company who own the freehold to the property.  

I hope that makes sense?

Zerforax

Might be worth double checking the company details etc to check that it's not a scam.

jimbog

FrankFalcon said:

Hi Edddy

Because I don't have the actual docs in front of me I can't remember the term remaining.  It appears I made a mistake in who I said I was going to write to.  

If I can't easily locate the docs it would probably be easier if I wrote to the author of the letter 'Pier' and also the company who own the freehold to the property.  

I hope that makes sense?

I read some poor reviews about them on Trustpilot - I would not rely on them personally