My wife and I may need to rent out our Abbey Wood ground floor flat temporarily due to taking a sabbatical. We instructed a Abbey Wood conveyancing firm in 2003 but they have closed and we did not have the foresight to get any guidance as to whether the lease allows us to sublet. How do we find out?

The lease governs relations between the landlord and you the flat owner; in particular, it will say if subletting is not allowed, or permitted but only subject to certain caveats. The accepted inference is that if the lease contains no specific ban or restriction, subletting is permitted. The majority of leases in Abbey Wood do not contain subletting altogether – such a clause would undoubtedly devalue the flat. In most cases there is a basic requirement that the owner notifies the freeholder, possibly sending a duplicate of the tenancy agreement.

I have just appointed agents to market my ground floor flat in Abbey Wood.Conveyancing lawyers have not yet been instructed but I have just received a half-yearly maintenance charge invoice – Do I pay up?

The sensible thing to do is clear the service charge as normal because all ground rent and service charges will be apportioned on completion, so you will be reimbursed by the buyer for the period running from after the completion date to the next payment date. Most management companies will not acknowledge the buyer unless the service charges have been paid and are up to date so it is important for both buyer and seller for the seller to show that they are up to date. This will smooth the conveyancing process.

Back In 2009, I bought a leasehold house in Abbey Wood. Conveyancing and Godiva Mortgages Ltd mortgage are in place. A letter has just been received from someone claiming to own the reversionary interest in the property. It included a demand for arrears of ground rent dating back to 1994. The conveyancing practitioner in Abbey Wood who acted for me is not around.Do I pay?

The first thing you should do is contact the Land Registry to be sure that this person is indeed the new freeholder. It is not necessary to incur the fees of a Abbey Wood conveyancing practitioner to do this as you can do this on the Land Registry website for £3. Rest assured that in any event, even if this is the rightful landlord, under the Limitation Act 1980 the limitation period for recovery of ground rent is six years.

I am attracted to a two maisonettes in Abbey Wood which have in the region of forty five years remaining on the leases. Should I regard a short lease as a deal breaker?

There is no doubt about it. A leasehold apartment in Abbey Wood is a wasting asset as a result of the shortening lease. The closer the lease gets to zero years unexpired, the more it adversely affects the salability of the property. The majority of purchasers and lenders, leases with less than 75 years become less and less attractive. On a more positive note, leaseholders can extend their leases by serving a Section 42 Notice. One stipulation is that they must have owned the property for two years (unlike a Section 13 notice for purchasing the freehold, when leaseholders can participate from day one of ownership). When successful, they will have the right to an extension of 90 years to the current term and ground rent is effectively reduced to zero. Before moving forward with a purchase of a residence with a short lease term remaining you should talk to a solicitor specialising in lease extensions and leasehold enfranchisement. We are are happy to put you in touch with Abbey Wood conveyancing experts who will explain the options available to you during an initial telephone conversation free of charge. A more straightforward and quicker method of extending would be to contact your landlord directly and sound him out on the prospect of extending the lease You may find he or she is happy to negotiate informally and willing to consider your offer straight off, without having to involve anyone else. This will save you time and money and it could help you reach a lower price on the lease. You need to ensure that the agreed terms represent good long-term value compared with the standard benefits of the Section 42 Notice and that onerous clauses are not inserted into any redrafting of the lease.

I am a negotiator for a busy estate agency in Abbey Wood where we see a number of flat sales derailed due to leases having less than 80 years remaining. I have been given conflicting advice from local Abbey Wood 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?

As long as the seller has owned the lease for at least 2 years it is possible, to serve a Section 42 notice to commence the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. This means that the buyer need not have 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 prior to, or simultaneously with completion of the sale.

Alternatively, it may be possible 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 purchaser.

Notwithstanding our best endeavours, we have been unsuccessful in negotiating a lease extension in Abbey Wood. Can the Leasehold Valuation Tribunal adjudicate on premiums?

in cases where there is a absentee landlord or where there is disagreement about what the lease extension should cost, under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 you can apply to the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) to make a decision on the premium.

An example of a Lease Extension case for a Abbey Wood residence is Various @ Colombus Square in January 2012. the Tribunal calculated the premiums to be paid for new leases for each of the flats in Mariners Walk to be £3822 and the premium to be paid for the new lease of 2 Knights Court to be £4439. This case related to 13 flats. The the unexpired term as at the valuation date was 76 years.

I invested in buying a 2 bed flat in Abbey Wood, conveyancing formalities finalised half a dozen years ago. Can you work out an approximate cost of a lease extension? Comparable flats in Abbey Wood with a long lease are worth £268,000. The ground rent is £55 yearly. The lease runs out on 21st October 2080

With 54 years remaining on your lease we estimate the price of your lease extension to be between £36,100 and £41,800 plus legals.

The suggested premium range that we have given is a general guide to costs for extending a lease, but we cannot give you the actual costs in the absence of comprehensive investigations. You should not use the figures in tribunal or court proceedings. There may be other concerns that need to be considered and you obviously want to be as accurate as possible in your negotiations. Neither should you take any other action placing reliance on this information before seeking the advice of a professional.