Stop! Your Lease Extension in Southgate Could Be FREE

Many leaseholders in Southgate are unaware that their original lawyer had a duty to warn them about future mortgageability and saleability issues. Before you pay thousands to your freeholder, let us audit your purchase history. You might have a claim that pays for your lease extension in full

If you are facing a significant premium because your lease in Southgate has dropped toward the 80-year mark, your previous lawyer may be at fault. Our panel of experts specialise in recovering lease extension costs from negligent firms who failed to protect your investment.

Main reasons to commence your Southgate lease extension


Main reasons to start your Southgate lease extension today:

Increase your lease and increase your Southgate property value

With a domestic leasehold premises in Southgate, you are actually purchasing an entitlement to reside in a property for a prescribed time frame. Modern flat leases typically tend to be for 99 years or 125. Many leasehold owners become complacent as this seems like a long period of time, you may consider extending the lease sooner as opposed to later. Accepted thinking is that the shorter the lease is the cost of extending the lease increases markedly particularly once there are less than eighty years remaining. Anyone in Southgate with a lease drawing near to 81 years left should seriously consider extending it as soon as possible. Once a lease has under eighty years left, under the relevant Act the landlord is entitled to calculate and demand a larger premium, based on a technical computation, known as “marriage value” which is due.

An extended lease is almost the same value as a freehold

It is conventional wisdom that a property with over 100 years unexpired lease term is worth approximately the same as a freehold. Where an additional 90 years added to any lease with more than 45 years remaining, the premises will be equivalent in value to a freehold for many years in the future.

Lenders may decide not to grant a mortgage on a short lease

Banks and building societies are really clamping down as regards to homes in Southgate with short leases. For example you may find that their lending requirements are stricter and that they adjust interest rates depending on how many years are left on the lease. Some may even refrain from lending completely, so where you needed to sell, your only options would be to find a cash purchaser, or hope for the best at auction thus narrowing your market.

Lender Requirement
Barclays plc Leases with less than 70 years at the commencement of the mortgage are not acceptable.

Leases with fewer than 70 years should only be referred to the issuing office where the following scenario applies, as discretion may be applied subject to bank approval:

• Property is located in any of the following prestigious developments: Cadogan, Crown, Grosvenor, Howard de Walden, Portman or Wellcome Trust Estates in Central London AND
• The value of the property subject to the short remaining term is £500,000 or more AND
• The loan to value does not exceed 90% for purchases, 90% like for like re-mortgages, 80% for re-mortgages with any element of capital raising and 80% for existing Barclays mortgage borrowers applying for additional borrowing;
Halifax Minimum 70 years from the date of the mortgage.
Leeds Building Society 85 years remaining from the start of the mortgage.
Skipton Building Society 85 years from the date of completion of the mortgage

For Buy to Let cases:
- lettings must not breach any of the lessee’s covenants; and
- consent of the lessor to lettings must be obtained if necessary
TSB Minimum of 70 years at mortgage commencement, with 30 years remaining at mortgage redemption.

Get in touch with one of our Southgate lease extension solicitors or enfranchisement solicitors

Regardless of whether you are a tenant or a landlord in Southgate,the lease extension experts that we work with will always be prepared to discuss any residential leasehold matters and offer you the benefit of their in-depth market knowledge and the close ties they enjoy with Southgate valuers.

Southgate Lease Extension Example Cases:

Jasper, Southgate, North London

In 2014 Jasper, started to get near to the 80-year mark with the lease on his ground floor apartment in Southgate. Having bought his flat 19 years previously, the length of the lease was of minimal importance. Fortunately, it dawned on him that he would soon be paying an inflated amount for Extending the lease. Jasper arranged for a lease extension just under the wire in July. Jasper and the landlord subsequently agreed on sum of £5,500 . If he had missed the deadline, the price would have gone up by a minimum £875.

Southgate case:

Dr Nathaniel Scott bought a recently refurbished flat in Southgate in June 2011. The dilemma was if we could shed any light on how much (roughly) compensation to the landlord could be for a 90 year lease extension. Similar premises in Southgate with 100 year plus lease were in the region of £280,000. The average ground rent payable was £45 billed monthly. The lease lapsed in 2097. Taking into account 71 years left we estimated the premium to the freeholder to extend the lease to be between £12,400 and £14,200 not including costs.

Decision in Barnet

An example of a Freehold Enfranchisement matter before the tribunal for a Southgate premises is 23 Beaconsfield Road in July 2013. The Tribunals decided that the amount payable was £31,203 for the freehold. This case related to 2 flats. The remaining number of years on the lease was 70.31 years.