Help with leasehold ; complicated?

Altior

The abridged story is that I purchases a SO property in 2011, and fully staircased 10 years later.

The lease I signed in 2011 clearly states 99 years. So this is definitely the time to consider extending.

Slightly bizarrely, my lease doesn't have a date on my hard copy. So I used an online tool called the Leasehold Advisory Service to identify the exact date of the lease.

To my surprise, it stated:

There are 106 Years 9 Months 18 Days* remaining on the lease *** as of 11 February 2026.

🟢 No immediate action required

Your lease term is over 90 years, so there is no immediate need to extend your lease.

When your lease falls below 90 years, you may want to start thinking about the process to extend your lease.

I know for sure that is was 99 years in 2011! I looked around to see if I could get a copy of the lease that the advisory service is scraping the data from. Some info online suggested I could see the lease via the Title register, so I paid £7 for this.

The lease is not on there, but I identified the data that the advisory service is pulling from:

5 2011-01-17 Short particulars of the lease(s) (or under-lease(s)) under which the land is held: Date : 22 November 2010 Term : 125 years from 1 December 2007 Parties : (1) Cala Ventures Limited (2) Aragon Housing Association Limited.

Cala was the developer, Aragon the original HA. The property was completed in Oct 2010. So that detail above I'm assuming relates to the freehold and Aragon.

Can someone clarify what that means for me? Do I effectively ignore the 'No immediate action required'. Did the HA get a 125 year lease and only give me 99? Why does the HA have a lease at all, I staircased through them, so I assumed they owned the freehold?

This is pretty complicated for me, as per my title! I'm quite happy to get the ball rolling and contact the experts to extend if I need to, what I am trying to establish is if I need to do that (to keep on the right side of 80 years). The new HA has a full process in place for lease extensions So it's just whether I need to do it in the near future (or not).

Thanks !

user1977

I would guess the HA has a head lease of the whole building/development and you have an underlease of your flat. So you need to look for your title rather than the HA's title or the freeholder's title.

Altior

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81880318#Comment_81880318

Thanks!

It is my title, as far as I know.

There was two listed for the property, Leasehold and Freehold.

The one I purchased is the Leasehold:

Title register for: **** (Leasehold)

It also has these updates under 'Charges Register', which correlate with my staircasing in 2021:

4 2021-06-07 REGISTERED CHARGE dated 26 May 2021. NOTE: Principal Deed formerly registered under BM****67.
5 2021-06-07 Proprietor: SANTANDER UK PLC (Co. Regn. No. 2294747) of Deeds Services, 101 Midsummer Boulevard, Milton Keynes MK9 1AA.

Altior

Possibly it's a common scenario, but hypothetically, if I sold my property I don't know how anyone would be able to identify the original lease. The HA has gone through multiple iterations as well, it's perhaps not guaranteed they have a copy of the original lease.

For context this is not a block or anything. All the properties around me were freehold and nothing to do with the HA. My service charge is only for buildings insurance, I do all my own maintenance.

Altior

Ah, I'm listed as the Registered owner under the Register summary section of this Title register.

+

B: Proprietorship register
This register specifies the class of title and identifies the owner. It contains any entries that affect the right of disposal.

Class of title: Title absolute

Entry number Entry date
1 2021-06-07 PROPRIETOR: [Me & this address]
2 2011-01-17 The price, other than rents, stated to have been paid on the grant of the lease was £***,***.
3 2021-06-07 The Transfer to the proprietor contains a covenant to observe and perform the covenants referred to in the Charges Register and of indemnity in respect thereof.

eddddy

Altior said:

All the properties around me were freehold and nothing to do with the HA. My service charge is only for buildings insurance,

Can you clarify - is your property a house or a flat? (It can make a big difference.) It sounds more like your property is a house.

• If it's a house, HA leases often say that the freehold can be transferred to the homeowner for free, once you've staircased to 100%. (But in your case, it sounds like the HA own a headlease rather than the freehold - so that might not apply.)

• Also, if it's a house, you wouldn't normally extend the lease anyway - you would buy the freehold instead.

But again, if the HA own a headlease rather than the freehold, trying to buy the freehold informally probably won't work.

You would need to use your statutory right to buy the freehold - the process is called 'Statutory Enfranchisement'.

See: https://www.lease-advice.org/buying-and-selling/buying-the-freehold/buying-the-freehold-houses/

Altior

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81880540#Comment_81880540

Thanks eddddy

It's a maisonette. My property is ostensibly self contained, from the outside it looks like a house, own front door etc. But all the living area is on the first floor. On the ground floor is a small entrance hall and stairway. On one side of the entrance is open access to private forecourt parking (including mine) underneath part of my living area, on the other is a neighbour's car port, accessed from the rear (from the front it's a plain wall as part of the face of the property).

I'm assuming I would never get the freehold as some of the land is required for access to the parking forecourt. The forecourt is divided between the four properties (including mine).

eddddy

Altior  said:

It's a maisonette. My property is ostensibly self contained, from the outside it looks like a house, own front door etc. But all the living area is on the first floor. On the ground floor is a small entrance hall and stairway. On one side of the entrance is open access to private forecourt parking (including mine) underneath part of my living area, on the other is a neighbour's car port, accessed from the rear (from the front it's a plain wall as part of the face of the property).

I'm assuming I would never get the freehold as some of the land is required for access to the parking forecourt. The forecourt is divided between the four properties (including mine).

The forecourt situation isn't relevant.

But your 'dwelling' is above another 'dwelling' - so according to the legislation it is a flat.

So your 2 main options would be:

• 1. Buy a lease extension
• 2. Team up with your downstairs neighbour (assuming they own 100% of their property), and jointly buy the freehold - then you could both extend your own leases

If you're interested in a lease extension, according to the link you posted, your HA will only do Statutory Lease extensions (not informal ones). So you would typically start by instructing a valuer and a solicitor to get the process started.

Altior

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81880675#Comment_81880675

Thanks again eddddy.

It is somewhat of a complicated scenario set/up. The neighbour's car port is nowhere near their property. In everyday language, they have the right to park there, but don't own the land.

Anyhow, I found that I still have a Title register that I downloaded a few years ago, when I was staircasing. The current title register references that old one:

New one under Charges register:

4 2021-06-07 REGISTERED CHARGE dated 26 May 2021. NOTE: Principal Deed formerly registered under BM****67.

-

The old one, under Property Register BM****67:

5. (05.08.2011) Short particulars of the lease(s) (or under-lease(s))
under which the land is held:
Date : 22 July 2011
Term : 99 years from 22 July 2011
Parties : (1) Aragon Housing Association Limited
(2) [Me]
NOTE 1: The tenant is under an obligation to surrender the lease in the
circumstances therein mentioned
NOTE 2: The lease contains a right of pre-emption

-

The new one under Property Register BM****06:

5 2011-01-17 Short particulars of the lease(s) (or under-lease(s)) under which the land is held: Date : 22 November 2010 Term : 125 years from 1 December 2007 Parties : (1) Cala Ventures Limited (2) Aragon Housing Association Limited

So this section within 'A: Property register' that referred to the 99 year lease before I staircased has been updated. In the old one, (1) was the HA, and (2) was me. In the new one, (1) is the developer, (2) is the HA.

This fries my brain anyway, but basically reference to my 99 year lease has been removed since I staircased, the new Title register that replaced the old one now references a 125 year lease that dates back to before I was involved with the property!

eddddy

Those look like 2 different leases (as opposed to a 'new' lease and an 'old' lease).

i.e. There is probably an 'intermediate lease' (also known as a Head lease) and a sub lease.

So the ownership structure is probably something like this:

• 1) Freeholder - Cala Ventures Limited
• 2) Head leaseholder - Aragon Housing Association Limited (part of Longhurst Group)
• 3) Sub Leaseholder - you

…and your sublease was for 99 years from 22 July 2011, so about 84 years remaining.

Altior said:

It is somewhat of a complicated scenario set/up. The neighbour's car port is nowhere near their property. In everyday language, they have the right to park there, but don't own the land.

As I mentioned, that won't be a barrier to jointly buying the freehold (or extending leases) - and your neighbour will still be able to park there.

Depending on the precise wording of the leases, if you jointly bought the freehold, either…

• Whoever currently owns that piece of freehold land would continue to own it and your neighbour could continue to park there

Or

• You and your neighbour would become joint freehold owners of that piece of land - and your neighbour could continue to park there, but you would have no right to park there

Altior

Thanks again Eddddy!

If it's relevant, in the bundle that the solicitor emailed me when everything related to the staircasing completed, there was a 'deed of substitution'. I think this means that the old title was replaced by the new one?:

On the land registration site there's only two titles linked to the address. The new leasehold one that I quoted from, and the freehold. I suppose I may as well pay another £7 for the freehold title to see exactly what it outlines.

I feel like I will need to consult the solicitors that carried out my staircasing, they do lease extensions. But the solicitor that completed my staircasing is now working at another firm :(

My neighbour who has use of the car port under my property has owned the freehold of his property since it was built. We are on speaking terms, but he isn't the type of person I would be asking to do me a favour. There's literally nothing in it for him to entertain the idea (even if it was possible). I do appreciate the indication that it might be an option, however.

For what it's worth I found this on the Amplius website:

Staircasing to 100 percent ownership

If you own an apartment and staircase to 100 percent ownership, you'd be purchasing the full leasehold interest. However, the terms and conditions relating to the Shared Ownership lease would no longer be applicable.