I am attracted to a two maisonettes in Bootle both have approximately forty five years remaining on the leases. Do I need to be concerned?

There are plenty of short leases in Bootle. The lease is a legal document that entitles you to use the property for a prescribed time frame. As a lease shortens the saleability of the lease decreases and it becomes more expensive to extend the lease. This is why it is often a good idea to increase the term of the lease. It is often difficulties arise selling premises with a short lease because mortgage lenders may be reluctant to lend money on properties of this type. Lease enfranchisement can be a difficult process. We recommend you seek professional help from a conveyancer and surveyor with experience in this field

I've recently bought a leasehold property in Bootle. Do I have any liability for service charges for periods before completion of my purchase?

Where the service charge has already been demanded from the previous owner and they have not paid you would not usually be personally liable for the arrears. Strange as it may seem, your landlord may still be able to take action to forfeit the lease. It is an essential part of leasehold conveyancing for your conveyancer to ensure to have an up to date clear service charge receipt before completion of your purchase. If you have a mortgage this is likely to be a requirement of your lender.

If you purchase part way through an accounting year you may be liable for charges not yet demanded even if they relate to a period prior to your purchase. In such circumstances your conveyancer would normally arrange for the seller to set aside some money to cover their part of the period (usually called a service charge retention).

I am employed by a busy estate agency in Bootle where we see a few flat sales derailed as a result of leases having less than 80 years remaining. I have been given inconsistent advice from local Bootle conveyancing firms. Can you shed some light as to whether the vendor of a flat can start the lease extension formalities for the purchaser on completion of the sale?

Provided that the seller has owned the lease for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to start the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. The benefit of this is that the buyer can avoid having to sit tight for 2 years to extend their lease. Both sets of lawyers will agree to form of assignment. The assignment has to be done before, or simultaneously with completion of the disposal of the property.

An alternative approach is to agree the lease extension with the freeholder either before or after the sale. If you are informally negotiating there are no rules and so you cannot insist on the landlord agreeing to grant an extension or transferring the benefit of an agreement to the buyer.

We expect to complete our sale of a £475000 apartment in Bootle in just under a week. The landlords agents has quoted £312 for Certificate of Compliance, insurance certificate and 3 years service charge statements. Is it legal for a freeholder to charge exorbitant fees for a leasehold conveyance in Bootle?

For most leasehold sales in Bootle conveyancing will involve, questions about the management of a building inevitably needing to be answered directly by the freeholder or its agent, this includes :

• Completing pre-contract enquiries
• Where consent is required before sale in Bootle
• Supplying insurance information
• Deeds of covenant upon sale
• Registering of the assignment of the change of lessee after a sale

Your lawyer will have no control over the level of the charges for this information but the average costs for the information for Bootle leasehold property is £350. For Bootle conveyancing transactions it is customary for the seller to pay for these costs. The landlord or their agents are under no legal obligation to answer such questions most will be willing to do so - albeit often at exorbitant prices where the fees bear little relation to the work involved. Unfortunately there is no law that requires fixed charges for administrative tasks. Neither is there any legal time frame by which they are required to provide the information.

Are there frequently found problems that you encounter in leases for Bootle properties?

There is nothing unique about leasehold conveyancing in Bootle. All leases is drafted differently and drafting errors can sometimes mean that certain sections are not included. For example, if your lease is missing any of the following, it could be defective:

• A provision to repair to or maintain parts of the premises
• A duty to insure the building
• Clauses dealing with recovering service charges for expenditure on the building or common parts.
• Service charge per centages that don't add up correctly leaving a shortfall

A defective lease can cause issues when trying to sell a property as they can affect a potential buyer’s ability to obtain a mortgage. Santander, Coventry Building Society, and Barclays Direct all have express conveyancing instructions when it comes to what is expected in a lease. If a mortgage lender believes that the lease is problematic they may refuse to grant the mortgage, obliging the buyer to withdraw.

Bootle Conveyancing for Leasehold Flats - Sample of Queries Prior to buying

Does the lease include onerous restrictions? For many Bootle leaseholds the cost for major works are not built into the service charges, albeit that there some managing agents in Bootle ask tenants to pay into a sinking fund and this is used to offset against major works. How long is the Lease?

Other Topics

Lease Extensions in Bootle