Planning to complete next month on a garden flat in Longhope. Conveyancing lawyers have said that they will have a report out to me next week. What should I be looking out for?

The report on title for your leasehold conveyancing in Longhope should include some of the following:

• The unexpired lease term You should be advised as what happens when the lease ends, and informed of the importance of not letting the lease term falling below eighty years

Are pets allowed in the flat?

Does the lease prevent you from letting out the flat, or having a home office for business

You must be told what counts as a Nuisance in the lease

Whether your lease has a provision for a sinking fund?

Changes to the flat (alterations and additions)

Whether the landlord has obligations to ensure rights of quiet enjoyment over your property and do you know what it means in practice? For a comprehensive list of information to be included in your report on your leasehold property in Longhope please enquire of your lawyer in advance of your conveyancing in Longhope

Back In 2009, I bought a leasehold flat in Longhope. Conveyancing and Birmingham Midshires mortgage organised. I have received a letter from someone saying they have taken over the reversionary interest in the property. It included a demand for arrears of ground rent dating back to 1995. The conveyancing practitioner in Longhope who previously acted has long since retired.Do I pay?

First make enquiries of the Land Registry to make sure that the individual claiming to own the freehold is indeed the registered owner of the freehold reversion. There is no need to instruct a Longhope conveyancing practitioner to do this as you can do this on the Land Registry website for less than a fiver. Rest assured that regardless, even if this is the rightful freeholder, under the Limitation Act 1980 the limitation period for recovery of ground rent is six years.

I've recently bought a leasehold house in Longhope. Am I liable to pay service charges relating to a period prior to my ownership?

In a situation where the service charge has already been demanded from the previous lessee 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 be sure 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 a negotiator for a reputable estate agency in Longhope where we see a number of flat sales put at risk due to short leases. I have received contradictory information from local Longhope conveyancing solicitors. Can you confirm whether the seller 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 kick-start the lease extension process and assign the benefit of the notice to the purchaser. This means that the proposed purchaser need not have to wait 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 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 purchaser.

Our conveyancer has advised that he intends to complete and exchange simultaneously on the sale of our £250000 maisonette in Longhope in 8 days. The freeholder has quoted £420 for Certificate of Compliance, building insurance schedule and previous years service charge statements. Is it legal for a freeholder to charge an administration fee for a leasehold conveyance in Longhope?

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

• Addressing conveyancing due diligence enquiries
• Where consent is required before sale in Longhope
• Copies of the building insurance and schedule
• Deeds of covenant upon sale
• Registering of the assignment of the change of lessee after a sale

Your solicitor will have no control over the level of the charges for this information but the average costs for the information for Longhope leasehold property is £350. For Longhope 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 supply the information.

I invested in buying a studio flat in Longhope, conveyancing was carried out half a dozen years ago. Can you let me have an estimate of the premium that my landlord can legally expect in return for granting a renewal of my lease? Similar flats in Longhope with a long lease are worth £202,000. The average or mid-range amount of ground rent is £45 levied per year. The lease runs out on 21st October 2078

With only 53 years left to run we estimate the premium for your lease extension to be between £34,200 and £39,600 as well as professional fees.

The figure that we have given is a general guide to costs for extending a lease, but we are not able to advice on the actual costs without more comprehensive investigations. You should not use this information in a Notice of Claim or as an informal offer. There may be other issues that need to be considered and clearly you want to be as accurate as possible in your negotiations. Neither should you take any other action based on this information before getting professional advice.

Other Topics

Lease Extensions in Longhope