Pugnacious advocate for reform, leasehold valuer and LKP trustee, LOUIE BURNS explains why the good behaviour ‘pledge’ by freeholders worked up with government is full of perils … Leasehold valuerBeware of freeholders bearing gifts – The truth about the Government’s freeholder pledge Freeholders launch clandestine plot to outflank leasehold reform and make millions of homes […]
Sebastian O’Kelly’s article in Inside Housing: Social landlords must be stopped from abusing their power over leaseholders Inside Housing, news, analysis, and comment about the social housing sector in the UK.
Following on from the announcement of a sector “Pledge for leaseholders” by Secretary of State James Brokenshire on 28th March 2019 the Chair of the Communities Select Committee, Clive Betts MP, has been quick to respond. Chair Betts welcomed the government’s work but strongly cautioned against the pledge in a letter sent to the Secretary […]
DCLG stakeholders hear of ‘calamitous’ Law Commission report on exit fees – Better Retirement Housing The DCLG leasehold stakeholders’ group was told yesterday that the Law Commission report into exit and other fees published earlier this month was ‘calamitous’. The study had come about following the Office of Fair Trading investigations into the retirement housing […]
A fine article by Lauren Davidson. The answer to the question is, of course, that an awful lot of vested interests spend out grandly to keep the whole nonsense going. The key question for policymakers is: are we creating homes (and subsidising them as taxpayers through Help To Buy) or creating investment assets for freehold […]
CityAM, the freesheet London morning newspaper, today published LKP’s response to an article earlier in the week by solicitors at Charles Russell Speechlys. The solicitors, who come in pairs (which may be an indication of the content), were gigging through the usual nonsense about commonhold tenure: “be careful what you wish for”; “babies and bathwater”; […]
Embargo 00.01 March 28 2018 The government and panicky leasehold monetisers have cobbled together a sort of “code of practice” or good behaviour pledge – mainly in response to the Communities Select Committee’s thoroughly researched assault on leasehold practices published earlier this month. Forty developers and freeholders have pledged to free the 12,000 leaseholders trapped […]
By Sebastian O’Kelly The industrial scale plundering of property assets in England and Wales were revealed in figures published by the whistleblowing organisation Global Witness last week. It believes that over 87,000 properties in England and Wales are owned by anonymous companies registered in tax havens. The value of these properties is at least £56 […]
The Competition and Markets Authority agrees that leaseholders trapped by rip-off ground rents are suffering “significant detriment”, but Brexit means it cannot help. This was the bleak message to Communities Secretary James Brokenshire last November. “Our ability to launch new discretionary work such as this is significantly affected by the near-time preparations that we must […]
The Leasehold Knowledge Partnership warmly endorses the Communities Select Committee report published today. We have campaigned since January 2012 to see a parliamentary report turn such a clear-eye to this murky and exploitative corner of the housing market. The report is a huge vindication of our efforts. The report amounts to a demolition of the […]
Tory MP Stephen McPartland has successfully shamed Long Harbour / Adriatic Land into varying 15-year doubling ground rents that trapped young families in unsellable homes. Last month Mr McPartland raised the issue in the Commons of 130 shared-equity leaseholders at Six Hills House in Stevenage being unable to sell their properties. But yesterday the beneficial […]
A campaign group of leaseholders in private blocks with Grenfell cladding is being formed. It is calling itself the UK Cladding Action Group: UKCAG and can be contacted here: ukcladdingactiongroup@gmail.com LKP welcomes the initiative and will do all that it can to assist. The Guardian reports: “Only 10 of the 173 private buildings discovered with […]
Makes a change from hiding behind lobbyists and lawyers and threatening, for example, the Law Commission, with judicial reviews By Sebastian O’Kelly LKP director Here is an interesting article today on the Tortoise long read journalism site from former banker-turned-residential-freehold investor Peter Sugarman, of the JRJ Group. It says his views are his own, but […]
In yet another retreat by plc house builders, the Aussie giant Lendlease is stumping up to pay to remove the Grenfell cladding at Vallea Court and Cypress Place, in Manchester’s Green Quarter. Before government ministers start talking rubbish about “freeholders doing the decent thing” – or worse, describing these speculators in residential freehold income streams […]
A very good Daily Mail story today revealing that last November Communities Secretary James Brokenshire was demanding inquiries into 100,000 buyers trapped in new toxic leases. So, no reason not to get on with banning leasehold houses – the easy bit – and reducing new ground rents to zero: which private equity speculators and […]
Consultation on the Law Commission report on commonhold ends on Sunday at mid-night. Please make sure you make a contribution. Question 94 is pretty open-ended, where leaseholders can say why they think a commonhold structure would be an improvement on current leasehold. The bulk of the Law Commission consultation is concerned with making commonhold work […]
