leasehold.reform@communities.gov.uk It is vital that as many leaseholders as possible respond to the government consultation to reform leasehold, ban leasehold houses and address ground rents. The government is pushing £10pa ground rents, which will keep the WHOLE leasehold racket going. If there is a legitimate income in residential freeholds, they will be traded and used […]
Using a flat for “immoral purposes” can be grounds for forfeiture The Sunday Times today exposes a prime London site belonging to freeholder, insurance tycoon and Conservative Party donor Christopher Moran as being full prostitutes. Many have to sell their bodies 30 times a month before they can afford the rents of £3,000 a month […]
And sector offers up yet another ‘code of practice’, this time for freeholders (whoever they may be when hidden offshore) One of the greatest fictions of the leasehold sector is that freeholders – even anonymous offshore ones – are the only reliable long-term stewards of a block of flats. The leasehold owners would be incapable, […]
By Sebastian O’Kelly On Monday, MPs of the Communities Select Committee at last flushed out the developers and ground rent speculators who profit from turning ordinary families’ homes into long term investment assets. A murky sector that habitually hides behinds the courts, lawyers, lobbyists and trade bodies finally had to justify its practices and, indeed, […]
It is reported in the Liverpool Echo that solicitor Liam McEleavey, of Gabriel Solicitors, has been jailed for three years three months for stealing £280,000. A solicitor in Gabriel Solicitors, a firm of Taylor Wimpey recommended solicitors – which, needless to say, failed to alert purchasers of predatory terms in the leases – has been […]
Model example of how to fight inflated insurance costs Leaseholders have been given a model example of how to fight excessive insurance costs following a tribunal victory against the Regis Group. Jeremy Peachey, a chartered surveyor, challenged the £13,000 insurance cost at a 30-flat site in Northampton where the freehold is owned by the Regis […]
London freeholder Israel Moskovitz has suffered a humiliating defeat in tribunal failing to stop 24-flat Bridge Court South, in Leyton north-east London, from exercising right to manage. In a sharply worded ruling, the tribunal told the freeholder he was to drop the “nonsense” of “putting up obstacles without any genuine foundation” to frustrate the leaseholders’ […]
… Beside most whinging leaseholders are buy-to-let investors Full marks to Mainstay for making the most nakedly self-interested submission to MP members of the Community Select Committee. Mainstay is a property management company, but also invests in residential freeholds. It says: “Our customer base of some 80,000 flatted leaseholders suggest that 58% are owned by […]
Developers like Taylor Wimpey and ground rent investors such as Long Harbour (Adriatic Land, Abacus Land, HomeGround) appear before the Select Committee today. Taylor Wimpey is fielding a relatively junior employee, with courageous CEO Pete Redfern staying well clear. Here are a couple of questions: Taylor Wimpey Ground Rent Review Scheme has £130 million set […]
On 14th November Liverpool City Council met and considered leasehold housing and have asked the Mayor to write to SoS Brokenshire to express their “severe dissatisfaction” with the government and their failure to do more to help thousands of leaseholders burdened with onerous lease terms and administration fees. Liverpool Council agenda is unequivocal Those at […]
Another brilliant initiative by the fiery National Leasehold Campaign activists: leave reviews of your purchasing experience – or freeholder and managing agent, for that matter – on TrustPilot and similar review sites. The National Leasehold Campaign, which is a closed (ie not publicly published) Facebook group, now has more than 12,000 members and is the […]
If you have strong views – we have! – over the 25% commercial exclusion to collective enfranchisement on mixed use sites, the Law Commission wants to hear from you. This point could not have been more forcibly made by Law Commissioner Nicholas Hopkins at the LKP-organised meeting last Saturday at the Law Society, in central […]
Changes to impose VAT on the salaries of house managers and concierges in blocks of flats will add £50 million to service charges, Rendall and Rittner tells LKP. Founder Duncan Rendall said: “This is a huge own goal by the Government given their stated objectives of trying to reduce the cost of leasehold. “The capitalised […]
Cherry Jones, a Swindon property manager and champion of leaseholders, has resigned from the Conservative Party over the government back-tracking over leasehold reform. In correspondence to local Swindon MPs Robert Buckland, also the Solicitor-General, and Justin Tomlinson, she says: “I have resigned my conservative membership. I am embarrassed by the party I have supported all […]
Solicitor Cassandra Zanelli has been challenged over evidence she presented to the Welsh Assembly over who will pay to remove Grenfell cladding at private blocks of flats. Miss Zanelli, who was representing the Federation of Private Residents Associations as an “honorary consultant” at a session on September 27, told a committee of the Assembly that […]
By Harry Scoffin Want to make your views known about the property tribunal and the government’s proposed “specialist housing court”? Now’s your chance. The government launched yet another consultation relevant to leaseholders yesterday: into streamlining access to justice for tenants and landlords. It said: “Government will seek views on a specialist Housing Court which, if […]
The new chief executive of McCarthy and Stone John Tonkiss is delighted the government has caved in over retirement housing ground rents, while announcing strategic changes that were prompted by the prospect of this reform. The company argued strongly in favour of ground rents because it was disadvantaged by having to provide communal areas at […]
Helen Goodman, Labour MP for Bishop Auckland, today launches her Private Members Bill to ban “fleecehold” charges on private estates. These are a where new estates have roads, lighting and communal spaces unadopted by the local council, which have to be maintained at the residents’ expense. Inevitably in the property world, this has become another […]
