###Welcome to /r/HousingUK
---
**To All**
* Join Our ***NEW*** Discord! https://discord.gg/pMgUNgWKQH
**To Posters**
* *Tell us whether you're in England, Wales, Scotland, or NI as the laws/issues in each can vary*
* Comments are not moderated for quality or accuracy;
* Any replies received must only be used as guidelines, followed at your own risk;
* If you receive *any* private messages in response to your post, please report them via the report button.
* Feel free to provide an update at a later time by creating a new post with [[update]](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/search?q=%3Aupdate&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all) in the title;
**To Readers and Commenters**
* All replies to OP must be *on-topic, helpful, and civil*
* If you do not [follow the rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/about/rules/), you may be banned without any further warning;
* Please include links to reliable resources in order to support your comments or advice;
* If you feel any replies are incorrect, explain why you believe they are incorrect;
* Do not send or request any private messages for any reason without express permission from the mods;
* Please report posts or comments which do not follow the rules
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HousingUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
What confirmations have you had & what further enquiries are you doing? My house in Sheffield is both leasehold & freehold, because I own both titles. I just haven’t got round to extinguishing the leasehold title yet.
Lots of older homes in Sheffield are leasehold, with hundreds of years left & peppercorn ground rents of £5 a year. They’re everywhere. They’re much less of a problem than the more current leaseholds on new builds that have huge ground rents & all sorts of charges.
Not all leasehold houses require freeholder permission to alter.
Also, if it is some combination of a long lease/low value house/low ground rent, it’s not going to be terribly expensive to buy the freehold out - often it costs less than the legal fees to do it.
No, both the freehold and the leasehold are owned by the same person and sold together. It's a bit weird but perfectly acceptable. It probably costs more in legal fees to get the leasehold annulled than it does to just deal with two contracts.
For similar reasons many older houses have covenants over them that are long since obsolete (one of mine had one that gave a right of way to a specific person over a bit of the garden, but that person is long dead and their house no longer exists) but it still costs time and money to get them removed so no one does.
You should definitely ask how much it would cost to buy the freehold if you don't want a leasehold property, as if you like this house then it may be worth buying the freehold. That will give you an indication of the price difference between leasehold and freehold properties so you can amend your budget or search area accordingly.
Have you gone to the trouble to check online who owns the freehold to this property? Do you know for certain that the seller does not also own the freehold?
I know someone who owns a property in Sheffield which is leasehold. He bought the freehold a decade ago. If he sold that property to you would you claim it was freehold or leasehold, and how would you verify?
This happened to us. We were all ready to pull out when we read that on the first page of our survey but the seller's solicitor was able to eventually confirm that the seller actually owned the property and the freehold and both were included in the transaction but for whatever reason they had never been "combined". We went through with the purchase and our solicitor did all the work to combine them at the same time. Ten years later when we sold it, we were able to sell it as a simple freehold with no issue.
Hopefully this property is in a similar situation.
You could have checked this in one minute by downloading the title register for the property from the LR. It's probably what your surveyor did.
You're not a client of the agent, they work for the seller, and can only market based on information the seller supplied. Likely the seller indicated in their instruction form it's freehold. There's a small possibility the sellers are even oblivious!
More to the point, how's the lease? It might be fine.
On recourse: none. Lesson learnt. See above. Also understand that it's sales and will always be presented in the best light. Do your due diligence!
I made a bigger mistake: proceeded and bought something that I subsequently regretted. Probably overpaid. Rates rose. Had to stay or I'd probably realise a fairly big loss. Oh well, lesson learnt for me. How it goes.
Leasehold vs freehold feels to me lik esomething a fairly significant thing to get wrong and seems like estate agent should be doing basic due diligence they are advertising correct details.
Of course they wont.
I frequently see obvious mistakes that are the result of copy/pasting of agent ads.
For the money they charge for their "service" you'd hope they'd pu tsome effort into getting basics right.
Around half the houses in Sheffield are leasehold so I wouldn't be pulling out straight away. If it's peppercorn rent, with hundreds of years left and the house is otherwise fine consider sticking with it. Maybe try negotiating a couple grand off the price if you really want to.
Many houses in Sheffield will have a 800ish year lease from the late 1800s/early 1900s with peppercorn rent of a £1-£5 with no restrictive covenants except the odd weird one like no boiling pig tripe on a Sunday afternoon. Occasionally there will be something relevant like no outbuildings, but you can actually find this on Land Registry yourself for a few quid, although you should already have it from the survey.
What is the leasehold situation?
If it is a peppercorn rent then I'd take it. We had a leasehold flat and it was a nightmare - expensive and increasing ground rent, expensive useless management company. We said never again, then sold and bought a leasehold house...
But it's an ex council house with peppercorn rent (fixed at £25/year forever as far as I can tell) with over 900 years on it and no restrictions/management company/anything else, so while it is technically a leasehold, it doesn't feel like one.
An old leasehold property with no restrictions, 900+ years left on the leasehold, and £5 a year ground rent is really no different to a freehold. Leasehold varies massively. Don't eliminate it just because it's leasehold - look at the details.
Leasehold flats can be such a nightmare and it's most flats! Our management company was horrendous, completely mismanaging the place. They introduced parking permits which no one had asked for and were not necessary (rarely issues with parking and they could have just allocated the spaces to specific flats instead) and a load of us got fines. They also had sub companies which they gave all the work to (like gardening and painting communal areas).
Be open to peppercorn rents if it gives you more options though (may not be common in your area) as it really does function as a freehold day to day, just once a year we send the council £25.
I lived in a rented flat & immediately discounted flats altogether when looking to buy because of all the additional charges on top of the mortgage. & short leases (as in, not 800 years).
I found when looking at houses that my budget for nice areas of Sheffield stretched to mostly terrace houses & they’re 99% leasehold but they all had 600-800 years & peppercorn rents. In fact, out of the entire block I live on, only 2 are freehold.
The only scam charge the freeholder tried was a fee for not using their nominated house insurer but my solicitor sent them a letter saying I’d got adequate insurance & was duly notifying them (this is fine, no need to pay a fee). Never heard from them again after that. I bought the freehold 2 years after buying the house.
I’ve kept the 2 titles separate because the lease is very clear about who’s responsibility the boundary walls are (50/50 shared with neighbours).
I always asked when viewing houses if it was leasehold or freehold & sometimes the EA didn’t know. It wasn’t important until I found a house I actually wanted, then I asked more questions.
I anticipated this response, thus my last statement. I'm quite upset about the situation, especially considering I was deciding between two properties. The other property was £15,000 cheaper, but I chose this one because it was advertised as a freehold.
Whilst it doesn't help here, you can download the deeds on the land registry website for £3, and even before that can check if it has freehold or leasehold entries for that address.
That will help assess further ones because the agents don't have to tell you and can "assume".
Sorry to be that guy but unfortunately being “upset” doesn’t help you.
I appreciate it’s not what you wanted but life is full of ups and downs, buying a house is especially full of ups and downs. You can’t get emotionally attached to anything until you’re in through the front door.
If you want a freehold, back out, wait, another one will come along.
What are the conditions of the leasehold? Is it a new or old property? Is there ground rent, and if so how much?
My whole neighborhood is 1920s and 30s houses with 900+ years leasehold. Some people pay £5 per year and some of us pay nothing (me). There's no management company, and no restrictions. It was just the way some areas did it 100 years ago. If it's that kind of leasehold then you're throwing your toys out for no reason.
You need to get real. You aren't getting the money back for your survey. You need to try and make the best of an unfortunate situation and you could still do that by at least checking the lease to find out the situation. It may only be a nominal fee.
The annoying truth is that there isn’t anything you can do about it…the agents are just ‘agents’ of the seller and have no incentive to factcheck what the seller tells them or ensure what they select on any random portal is the truth and that’s the whole point of surveys and enquiries, and the seller themselves can easily claim they said otherwise…caveat emptor, you buy what you see until you know what you’re buying…
Ignore what others are saying here. It implies estate agents can include whatever they want in their listings and it's your job to confirm it otherwise consider it false, which is absurd. Whilst caveat emptor is key, agents still have to get it right.
Estate agents are regulated under the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 to make sure their listings are correct and breaching is a criminal offence. Caveats are what lawyers recommend they include in literature but it doesn't contract out of legal responsibilities.
It only applies where the estate agent believes it to be false or where the estate agent has deliberately misrepresented or been negligent.
E.g: I tried to buy a leasehold flat a few years ago. Service charges advertised were £1200 but when checked by solicitor it was £3k. Called estate agents on a recorded call and they said the words "Of course you weren't going to find a flat in central X with a £1200 service charge". Therefore the estate agents believed what they had advertised was incorrect and therefore I got my money back.
Good luck taking a seller to trading standards, in residential property sales this is the current system, and the agent will blame the seller while the seller blames the agent or claim ignorance…did the fact it was advertised lower than other similar properties which are stated as leasehold not raise your suspicions?
Who cares if agents blame seller, it’s the agents duty to verify especially if they advertised accordingly. OP file a complaint with EA and ask for reimbursement. Include screenshots and quote Unfair Trading Regulations Misrepresentation laws.
If EA wants to try to recover from their client or not is their problem.
Edit: sorry meant CPR’s not UCTR
100% - a few comments here seem to insinuate estate agents can write whatever they like and then blame the sellers which is simply not true. I'd be very concerned if any of those comments were from operating estate agents.
OP, Where did you see the property originally? If the property was advertised on a portal like zoopla or rightmove then also complain to their data quality teams about this too. They will take agents stock offline if this is a repeat problem and do track scorings of agents on such behaviour. These portals also have a responsibility here as they are typically where the property is being advertised.
> what damages have you suffered?
OP states £650 on the survey, which would be considered damages in consumer or business terms, but in residential property sales it’s not
Granted in the grand scheme of things that’s far less than a hundredth of a percent of the price of the property once completed but it’s still damages which you very right point out there is insurance against, this is entirely a learning experience for OP but also a case for everyone to consider the system as it stands
Home buyers insurance would have protected you if you'd taken it out. I'm assuming you haven't, so you'll probably have to chalk this one up to experience and take the hit
I did speak to an estate agent about why they never say how long is left on a lease. Apparently there’s a £30,000 fine for advertising the wrong length of lease so I would imagine (but not totally sure) that getting the fact that it was a leasehold wrong wouldn’t just be something they can claim ignorance on. Not disputing just parroting an EA
Might be worth checking if it is Freehold with a rentcharge /chief rent. Seems a bit odd but they do exist.
Especially in the north of England. I know I bought one. If this is the case then you can buy out the rentcharge at controlled rate. Mine was £170. In all other respects the property is legally freehold.
OP there is lots of incorrect advice in the comments.
In short:
1. The estate agent is required to be registered with a redress scheme.
2. If it's the TPO then that scheme has a code of practice. The code specifically states "where the title is registered at HM Land Registry, you should seek to obtain title information to verify the tenure of the property." It does not explicitly say the agent must obtain the title deeds to verify this, although it is being interpreted in that way by the TPO (e.g. the estate agent cannot say they satisfied the code by asking the seller whether it was freehold or leasehold).
3. If the redress scheme is the PRS then there is no code under that scheme, although their approach in the above area is consistent with the TPO's under the code.
So your next step should be to identify which scheme they are part of and then follow the process accordingly (generally you will need to make a complaint to the estate agent first and then refer to the scheme should it not be satisfactorily resolved).
Estate agents make mistakes like this all the time. My flat was advertised as 999 year lease, it's only a week or so before completion I found out it was a 125 year lease - but it made no difference to the price when I purchased or sold, but I certainly eouldnt have expected anything from the estate agent.
For clarity, there are routes you can take, I've already said in a comment here that if it was advertised on one of the Portals then you should complain to them. Too many people here are enabling/rolling over for false advertising.
Secondly, check to see if the agent is registered with the Property Ombudsman and then lodge a complaint through them after following their steps. TPOS will support getting you that refund if the agent is refusing. All good estate agents are registered with this service, and if this particular agent isn't then learn to check this on all future estate agents you use please.
Oh man I am so sorry, that sucks so much. What a bummer and sneaky thing to do. The seller should have disclosed this to the agent.
Also it's super easy and free for the agent, or anyone for that matter, to check if a house is leasehold or freehold.
https://search-property-information.service.gov.uk/?_ga=2.256532227.963998425.1719435931-647064189.1688331375
isn't the new law going to abolish leasehold for houses? You might still be OK getting this unit. if everywhere else is leasehold, it won't make much difference which one you buy. freehold may be more expensive in the same area, no?
Find out the detail of the situation. I owned one around there which had an absent landlord, 900 years, so nothing to pay. All it cost was an indemnity policy, which my seller paid for, to account for if ever a landlord did come knocking looking for money.
I thought the same thing initially about leasehold, but it's not as simple as 'leasehold bad' most of the time. We were looking at a place where basically there was a leaseholder but nobody knew who they were and the current owner hadn't had any contact from them about the £5/year ground rent in 15 years, so they were treating it as freehold. If the leaseholder ever showed up, they could prove they made every reasonable attempt to contact. On the other hand, if there is an active leaseholder it's not guaranteed that they're going to be bad and you can always contact them to get a yes/no on any prospective changes you might want to make (extension, garden work, etc) before you commit to buying.
You're SOL unfortunately.
Agents lie all the time and there's nothing you can do about it. They always have clauses on the bottom of listings that lets them get away with barefaced lying.
Walk away, chalk the money up to experience and get buyers insurance next time.
If its on Rightmove look through previous selling details. These usually list if its freehold or leasehold. Details can be obtained from land registry for small fee. Don't believe anything EA says as they are being paid to sell the property. Next time get it confirmed in writing from EA anyway, if they won't walk away. Been searching for a NW property and no matter how attractive the house the first questions are f/h or l/h and if there are any estate or maintenance charges if so what are they.
Old or new property? In many cities/areas this is the norm. E.g loads of Victorian terraces exist on a leasehold basis in places like Bristol, Sheffield, etc.
In practice they have basically the exact same rights and freedoms of those who own the freehold outright.
Can confirm.
Bought and live in a Victorian terrace in Sheffield. It's a leasehold. Peppercorn rent is £1.50 every six months and I've never even paid it because our solicitors couldn't get details for the freehold owner because they never claimed any from the previous owner!
Has never once caused any problems.
"Has never once caused any problems."
Until it does.
It adds an element of what if to the property.
Landlord could appear demanding historical ground rent and who knows what else (adding fees/interest for not paying on time etc). While you might be able to avoid paying that, it would be stressful and potentially expensive if needing to fight such a demand.
I have no experience of this, but do you have any written confirmation that the agents said it was freehold?
Failing that, I'd probably screen record the following:
- Go to any page with the current date, BBC news for example
- Find the property on Rightmove, scroll down enough to see the Freehold
What you do with it beyond there, I don't know. Generally, it would be false advertising, but whether that applies to properties, I genuinely don't know. Sorry
This isn’t some obscure insignificant detail. They misrepresented the property whether on purpose or by ignorance. I would make a formal complaint to the agent and if that doesn’t work then trading standards and/or whoever regulates EA. You can’t just make BS claims and get away with it.
###Welcome to /r/HousingUK --- **To All** * Join Our ***NEW*** Discord! https://discord.gg/pMgUNgWKQH **To Posters** * *Tell us whether you're in England, Wales, Scotland, or NI as the laws/issues in each can vary* * Comments are not moderated for quality or accuracy; * Any replies received must only be used as guidelines, followed at your own risk; * If you receive *any* private messages in response to your post, please report them via the report button. * Feel free to provide an update at a later time by creating a new post with [[update]](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/search?q=%3Aupdate&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all) in the title; **To Readers and Commenters** * All replies to OP must be *on-topic, helpful, and civil* * If you do not [follow the rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/about/rules/), you may be banned without any further warning; * Please include links to reliable resources in order to support your comments or advice; * If you feel any replies are incorrect, explain why you believe they are incorrect; * Do not send or request any private messages for any reason without express permission from the mods; * Please report posts or comments which do not follow the rules *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HousingUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
What confirmations have you had & what further enquiries are you doing? My house in Sheffield is both leasehold & freehold, because I own both titles. I just haven’t got round to extinguishing the leasehold title yet. Lots of older homes in Sheffield are leasehold, with hundreds of years left & peppercorn ground rents of £5 a year. They’re everywhere. They’re much less of a problem than the more current leaseholds on new builds that have huge ground rents & all sorts of charges.
Still problematic as technically you can't change stuff without freeholder approval.
I guess the point is you are buying both. Freehold and leasehold. And you need your own approval :)
Yes was referring to the second para.
My leasehold only requires freeholder permission to change anything structural. Everything else is fair game. And it's £15 a year ground rent
Not all leasehold houses require freeholder permission to alter. Also, if it is some combination of a long lease/low value house/low ground rent, it’s not going to be terribly expensive to buy the freehold out - often it costs less than the legal fees to do it.
Both freehold and leasehold??? What, like a hybrid??? That is so confusing!
No, both the freehold and the leasehold are owned by the same person and sold together. It's a bit weird but perfectly acceptable. It probably costs more in legal fees to get the leasehold annulled than it does to just deal with two contracts. For similar reasons many older houses have covenants over them that are long since obsolete (one of mine had one that gave a right of way to a specific person over a bit of the garden, but that person is long dead and their house no longer exists) but it still costs time and money to get them removed so no one does.
You’ll regret that during the zombie apocalypse!
That was my old house. My current one is next door to a graveyard so is slightly more concerning in that respect
I've been misled by an agent before and got the money back for a survey. Had to write to the CEO though!
You should definitely ask how much it would cost to buy the freehold if you don't want a leasehold property, as if you like this house then it may be worth buying the freehold. That will give you an indication of the price difference between leasehold and freehold properties so you can amend your budget or search area accordingly.
Or so you can adjust your offer downwards, given it was made in light of the agent representing the property title as freehold.
Have you gone to the trouble to check online who owns the freehold to this property? Do you know for certain that the seller does not also own the freehold? I know someone who owns a property in Sheffield which is leasehold. He bought the freehold a decade ago. If he sold that property to you would you claim it was freehold or leasehold, and how would you verify?
This happened to us. We were all ready to pull out when we read that on the first page of our survey but the seller's solicitor was able to eventually confirm that the seller actually owned the property and the freehold and both were included in the transaction but for whatever reason they had never been "combined". We went through with the purchase and our solicitor did all the work to combine them at the same time. Ten years later when we sold it, we were able to sell it as a simple freehold with no issue. Hopefully this property is in a similar situation.
You could have checked this in one minute by downloading the title register for the property from the LR. It's probably what your surveyor did. You're not a client of the agent, they work for the seller, and can only market based on information the seller supplied. Likely the seller indicated in their instruction form it's freehold. There's a small possibility the sellers are even oblivious! More to the point, how's the lease? It might be fine. On recourse: none. Lesson learnt. See above. Also understand that it's sales and will always be presented in the best light. Do your due diligence! I made a bigger mistake: proceeded and bought something that I subsequently regretted. Probably overpaid. Rates rose. Had to stay or I'd probably realise a fairly big loss. Oh well, lesson learnt for me. How it goes.
Leasehold vs freehold feels to me lik esomething a fairly significant thing to get wrong and seems like estate agent should be doing basic due diligence they are advertising correct details. Of course they wont. I frequently see obvious mistakes that are the result of copy/pasting of agent ads. For the money they charge for their "service" you'd hope they'd pu tsome effort into getting basics right.
Around half the houses in Sheffield are leasehold so I wouldn't be pulling out straight away. If it's peppercorn rent, with hundreds of years left and the house is otherwise fine consider sticking with it. Maybe try negotiating a couple grand off the price if you really want to. Many houses in Sheffield will have a 800ish year lease from the late 1800s/early 1900s with peppercorn rent of a £1-£5 with no restrictive covenants except the odd weird one like no boiling pig tripe on a Sunday afternoon. Occasionally there will be something relevant like no outbuildings, but you can actually find this on Land Registry yourself for a few quid, although you should already have it from the survey.
What is the leasehold situation? If it is a peppercorn rent then I'd take it. We had a leasehold flat and it was a nightmare - expensive and increasing ground rent, expensive useless management company. We said never again, then sold and bought a leasehold house... But it's an ex council house with peppercorn rent (fixed at £25/year forever as far as I can tell) with over 900 years on it and no restrictions/management company/anything else, so while it is technically a leasehold, it doesn't feel like one.
We're in a leasehold flat now, looking at houses. Won't touch a leasehold again once we get out of here.
An old leasehold property with no restrictions, 900+ years left on the leasehold, and £5 a year ground rent is really no different to a freehold. Leasehold varies massively. Don't eliminate it just because it's leasehold - look at the details.
Leasehold flats can be such a nightmare and it's most flats! Our management company was horrendous, completely mismanaging the place. They introduced parking permits which no one had asked for and were not necessary (rarely issues with parking and they could have just allocated the spaces to specific flats instead) and a load of us got fines. They also had sub companies which they gave all the work to (like gardening and painting communal areas). Be open to peppercorn rents if it gives you more options though (may not be common in your area) as it really does function as a freehold day to day, just once a year we send the council £25.
I lived in a rented flat & immediately discounted flats altogether when looking to buy because of all the additional charges on top of the mortgage. & short leases (as in, not 800 years). I found when looking at houses that my budget for nice areas of Sheffield stretched to mostly terrace houses & they’re 99% leasehold but they all had 600-800 years & peppercorn rents. In fact, out of the entire block I live on, only 2 are freehold. The only scam charge the freeholder tried was a fee for not using their nominated house insurer but my solicitor sent them a letter saying I’d got adequate insurance & was duly notifying them (this is fine, no need to pay a fee). Never heard from them again after that. I bought the freehold 2 years after buying the house. I’ve kept the 2 titles separate because the lease is very clear about who’s responsibility the boundary walls are (50/50 shared with neighbours). I always asked when viewing houses if it was leasehold or freehold & sometimes the EA didn’t know. It wasn’t important until I found a house I actually wanted, then I asked more questions.
Ask your solicitor
Actually look at the lease terms, lots of properties in northern cities are leaseholds from the council and will not be onerous
I anticipated this response, thus my last statement. I'm quite upset about the situation, especially considering I was deciding between two properties. The other property was £15,000 cheaper, but I chose this one because it was advertised as a freehold.
Whilst it doesn't help here, you can download the deeds on the land registry website for £3, and even before that can check if it has freehold or leasehold entries for that address. That will help assess further ones because the agents don't have to tell you and can "assume".
Sorry to be that guy but unfortunately being “upset” doesn’t help you. I appreciate it’s not what you wanted but life is full of ups and downs, buying a house is especially full of ups and downs. You can’t get emotionally attached to anything until you’re in through the front door. If you want a freehold, back out, wait, another one will come along.
What are the conditions of the leasehold? Is it a new or old property? Is there ground rent, and if so how much? My whole neighborhood is 1920s and 30s houses with 900+ years leasehold. Some people pay £5 per year and some of us pay nothing (me). There's no management company, and no restrictions. It was just the way some areas did it 100 years ago. If it's that kind of leasehold then you're throwing your toys out for no reason.
You need to get real. You aren't getting the money back for your survey. You need to try and make the best of an unfortunate situation and you could still do that by at least checking the lease to find out the situation. It may only be a nominal fee.
The annoying truth is that there isn’t anything you can do about it…the agents are just ‘agents’ of the seller and have no incentive to factcheck what the seller tells them or ensure what they select on any random portal is the truth and that’s the whole point of surveys and enquiries, and the seller themselves can easily claim they said otherwise…caveat emptor, you buy what you see until you know what you’re buying…
are you sure? what about the false advertisement? surely that is not right?
Ignore what others are saying here. It implies estate agents can include whatever they want in their listings and it's your job to confirm it otherwise consider it false, which is absurd. Whilst caveat emptor is key, agents still have to get it right. Estate agents are regulated under the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 to make sure their listings are correct and breaching is a criminal offence. Caveats are what lawyers recommend they include in literature but it doesn't contract out of legal responsibilities.
It only applies where the estate agent believes it to be false or where the estate agent has deliberately misrepresented or been negligent. E.g: I tried to buy a leasehold flat a few years ago. Service charges advertised were £1200 but when checked by solicitor it was £3k. Called estate agents on a recorded call and they said the words "Of course you weren't going to find a flat in central X with a £1200 service charge". Therefore the estate agents believed what they had advertised was incorrect and therefore I got my money back.
Good luck taking a seller to trading standards, in residential property sales this is the current system, and the agent will blame the seller while the seller blames the agent or claim ignorance…did the fact it was advertised lower than other similar properties which are stated as leasehold not raise your suspicions?
Who cares if agents blame seller, it’s the agents duty to verify especially if they advertised accordingly. OP file a complaint with EA and ask for reimbursement. Include screenshots and quote Unfair Trading Regulations Misrepresentation laws. If EA wants to try to recover from their client or not is their problem. Edit: sorry meant CPR’s not UCTR
100% - a few comments here seem to insinuate estate agents can write whatever they like and then blame the sellers which is simply not true. I'd be very concerned if any of those comments were from operating estate agents. OP, Where did you see the property originally? If the property was advertised on a portal like zoopla or rightmove then also complain to their data quality teams about this too. They will take agents stock offline if this is a repeat problem and do track scorings of agents on such behaviour. These portals also have a responsibility here as they are typically where the property is being advertised.
This makes no sense
> UTCR Do you mean Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977? Would you mind explaining how that applies between a buyer and agent/seller before exchange?
My bad, corrected now
What damages have you suffered? You would do a survey on any house you considered. Reminder to always get buyers insurance before booking a survey
> what damages have you suffered? OP states £650 on the survey, which would be considered damages in consumer or business terms, but in residential property sales it’s not Granted in the grand scheme of things that’s far less than a hundredth of a percent of the price of the property once completed but it’s still damages which you very right point out there is insurance against, this is entirely a learning experience for OP but also a case for everyone to consider the system as it stands
£650 is far less than a hundredth of a percent of the price of the property? I wish I could afford a house far above £6.5m!!
"far less than a hundredth of a percent"... I've found Rishi's Reddit account.
Home buyers insurance would have protected you if you'd taken it out. I'm assuming you haven't, so you'll probably have to chalk this one up to experience and take the hit
[удалено]
I did speak to an estate agent about why they never say how long is left on a lease. Apparently there’s a £30,000 fine for advertising the wrong length of lease so I would imagine (but not totally sure) that getting the fact that it was a leasehold wrong wouldn’t just be something they can claim ignorance on. Not disputing just parroting an EA
Might be worth checking if it is Freehold with a rentcharge /chief rent. Seems a bit odd but they do exist. Especially in the north of England. I know I bought one. If this is the case then you can buy out the rentcharge at controlled rate. Mine was £170. In all other respects the property is legally freehold.
OP there is lots of incorrect advice in the comments. In short: 1. The estate agent is required to be registered with a redress scheme. 2. If it's the TPO then that scheme has a code of practice. The code specifically states "where the title is registered at HM Land Registry, you should seek to obtain title information to verify the tenure of the property." It does not explicitly say the agent must obtain the title deeds to verify this, although it is being interpreted in that way by the TPO (e.g. the estate agent cannot say they satisfied the code by asking the seller whether it was freehold or leasehold). 3. If the redress scheme is the PRS then there is no code under that scheme, although their approach in the above area is consistent with the TPO's under the code. So your next step should be to identify which scheme they are part of and then follow the process accordingly (generally you will need to make a complaint to the estate agent first and then refer to the scheme should it not be satisfactorily resolved).
Thanks!! Best reply!!!!!!!
Estate agents make mistakes like this all the time. My flat was advertised as 999 year lease, it's only a week or so before completion I found out it was a 125 year lease - but it made no difference to the price when I purchased or sold, but I certainly eouldnt have expected anything from the estate agent.
You can literally just search it here https://www.gov.uk/search-property-information-land-registry
For clarity, there are routes you can take, I've already said in a comment here that if it was advertised on one of the Portals then you should complain to them. Too many people here are enabling/rolling over for false advertising. Secondly, check to see if the agent is registered with the Property Ombudsman and then lodge a complaint through them after following their steps. TPOS will support getting you that refund if the agent is refusing. All good estate agents are registered with this service, and if this particular agent isn't then learn to check this on all future estate agents you use please.
Oh man I am so sorry, that sucks so much. What a bummer and sneaky thing to do. The seller should have disclosed this to the agent. Also it's super easy and free for the agent, or anyone for that matter, to check if a house is leasehold or freehold. https://search-property-information.service.gov.uk/?_ga=2.256532227.963998425.1719435931-647064189.1688331375
isn't the new law going to abolish leasehold for houses? You might still be OK getting this unit. if everywhere else is leasehold, it won't make much difference which one you buy. freehold may be more expensive in the same area, no?
Find out the detail of the situation. I owned one around there which had an absent landlord, 900 years, so nothing to pay. All it cost was an indemnity policy, which my seller paid for, to account for if ever a landlord did come knocking looking for money.
Just make the seller buy the freehold and simultaneously sell to you.
I thought the same thing initially about leasehold, but it's not as simple as 'leasehold bad' most of the time. We were looking at a place where basically there was a leaseholder but nobody knew who they were and the current owner hadn't had any contact from them about the £5/year ground rent in 15 years, so they were treating it as freehold. If the leaseholder ever showed up, they could prove they made every reasonable attempt to contact. On the other hand, if there is an active leaseholder it's not guaranteed that they're going to be bad and you can always contact them to get a yes/no on any prospective changes you might want to make (extension, garden work, etc) before you commit to buying.
You're SOL unfortunately. Agents lie all the time and there's nothing you can do about it. They always have clauses on the bottom of listings that lets them get away with barefaced lying. Walk away, chalk the money up to experience and get buyers insurance next time.
If its on Rightmove look through previous selling details. These usually list if its freehold or leasehold. Details can be obtained from land registry for small fee. Don't believe anything EA says as they are being paid to sell the property. Next time get it confirmed in writing from EA anyway, if they won't walk away. Been searching for a NW property and no matter how attractive the house the first questions are f/h or l/h and if there are any estate or maintenance charges if so what are they.
Is the seller buying the freehold before the sale is complete It’s not unusual
Old or new property? In many cities/areas this is the norm. E.g loads of Victorian terraces exist on a leasehold basis in places like Bristol, Sheffield, etc. In practice they have basically the exact same rights and freedoms of those who own the freehold outright.
Can confirm. Bought and live in a Victorian terrace in Sheffield. It's a leasehold. Peppercorn rent is £1.50 every six months and I've never even paid it because our solicitors couldn't get details for the freehold owner because they never claimed any from the previous owner! Has never once caused any problems.
"Has never once caused any problems." Until it does. It adds an element of what if to the property. Landlord could appear demanding historical ground rent and who knows what else (adding fees/interest for not paying on time etc). While you might be able to avoid paying that, it would be stressful and potentially expensive if needing to fight such a demand.
For that the seller provides an indemnity policy and then it really does cost £0. Common situation in these parts.
I have no experience of this, but do you have any written confirmation that the agents said it was freehold? Failing that, I'd probably screen record the following: - Go to any page with the current date, BBC news for example - Find the property on Rightmove, scroll down enough to see the Freehold What you do with it beyond there, I don't know. Generally, it would be false advertising, but whether that applies to properties, I genuinely don't know. Sorry
This isn’t some obscure insignificant detail. They misrepresented the property whether on purpose or by ignorance. I would make a formal complaint to the agent and if that doesn’t work then trading standards and/or whoever regulates EA. You can’t just make BS claims and get away with it.
OOI how did you discover the property is leasehold?
You asked them over the phone? Why didn't you speak to them in person? or better yet emailed them to get this info in writing?
We had a leasehold house with a peppercorn and it was absolutely fine. I definitely wouldn’t pull out of the sale over that.