Freehold Purchase Problem Collective Enfranchisement, nominations delayed.

[funkar]

Freehold Purchase Problem Collective Enfranchisement, nominations delayed.

Hello Everyone,

I’m in a situation where I need some honest advice. In nutshell, we are late in sending nominations and now freeholder refusing to sell freehold.

I, with four other leaseholders are buying freehold of our whole block which is having six flats inside. One of the leaseholder is not interested and he is the only one out. The freeholder company went into administration and appointed administrators sent all of us letters as qualifying tenants under 187 Act Sect 5A to accept the offer to buy and nominate within two + two months. 5 out of 6 of us agreed and sent our names back to them confirming our will to buy within first two months.

Later on we started contacting each other as no one was living there in that block, all the lessees had their flats rented out so it took us a while to get together, signing up a solicitor and forming up a company under which we could buy the freehold. When we finally formed up the company and sent the details to freeholder they refused to accept it saying after initial 2 months of offer acceptance (which we did) you had another two months of nominations to exercise your rights which you couldn’t do and we therefore not selling it to you anymore. We have another buyer now and we are going ahead with them.

 

We checked the article 10 of their offer notice as they mentioned and they were right, it was written there which neither we nor our so called solicitor bothered to check and we were approximately 10 days late. Our solicitor spoke to them and formally requested them to start the proceeding of purchase but freeholder’s administrators are not moving an inch from their stance. Looks like they already had a buyer on the back seat and they were waiting for any glitch to arise from us.

Now, our solicitor has sent a letter to freeholders stating our intentions to pursue the court if the sale goes ahead with third party. There has been no answer yet as it is only two days old activity.

I spoke to another solicitor meanwhile explaining whole situation and he says that we shouldn’t go to court as it might get turned down by court and you end up paying your and other side’s court and legal fees. He suggested that he can get it done through 1993 Act in which we contact the freeholder by ourselves and exercise the right to buy after getting the valuation of freehold done independently. In this route, if freeholder doesn’t agree we can go through tribunal to exercise our right to buy and all that legal stuff.

I’m quite confused at the moment what to do. Other 4 freeholders are also behind me. Whenever I update them, they just say to me that we will do whatever you say just don’t let it go. They don’t know much about these things. I don’t want to take any step which ends me up in being cursed by them for always. I’m not very confident about both solicitors either as first one looks not v experienced/competent in these matters and second one could just be looking after his business. That’s why I’m here to seek some honest advice.

 

Shall we go to court to stop the third party sale or shall we choose the 1993 ACT? Which one sounds more promising and what are the chances?

YOUR ADVICE IS HIGHLY APPRECIATED.

THANKS.

[raydetinu]

one for andydd I think, he is our expert. suggest you send him a pm.

[funkar]

Hi,

Thanks for referring to andydd. I couldn't PM as person is not in my friends list, sent a friend request though may be then i could.

Sorry, not an expert cagger yet.

[andydd]

Howdee.

 

My knowledge of collective enfranchisment (basicaly the leaseholders get together and buy the freehold) is lacking and it is quite a complex specialised area that would prob need the help of a solicitor, the freehold can often cost many thousands so in these circumstances the extra cost may not be much when split between the leaseholders.

 

I doubt whether anyone else here can advise you on such a complex (and important !) issue especially as you already have a solicitor, although I will add that it is surprisng how many fully qualified solicitors are severly lacking in leasehold law (I myself have managed to run rings around my FH's solicitor in court many times, and he was charging £200 an hour).

 

I would mention though that I'm aware that there are strict processes and timescales to adhere too and it can be disastrous if you fail to meet them,.

 

I certainly wouldn't automatically use my usual/local solicitor, I'd look around and find one specialising in such issues.

 

Perhaps try popping into Landlordzone Long Leasehold section although you may not get an answer due to points I mentioned above.

 

Here is the LEASE page on the subject, as you can see even as a basic guide it is quite long > http://www.lease-advice.org/publications/documents/document.asp?item=11

[funkar]

Thanks andydd for your advice, i will surely try Landlordzone too.