The Leasehold Advisory Service has come under parliamentary scrutiny with Sir Peter Bottomley asking the housing minister when the purpose of LEASE was last reviewed.
He has also asked that LEASE provide to him a public report on problems in the leasehold sector that are known to LEASE.
The controversial quango is up for review in December 2014, according to Kris Hopkins, the housing minister and Conservative MP for Keighley and Ilkley in Yorkshire – where 4,859 households live in leasehold properties (12.2 per cent of the electorate).
Hopkins also claimed that LEASE highlights leasehold issues in its annual report.
In fact, it does no such thing. Rather than examining the problems in leasehold – such as those that are reported in news articles on LKP – it eulogises its self-reported high levels of customer satisfaction and the efficiency of its management and leadership.
The report goes into no detail at all on any specific issue facing the sector.
The question was answered on Wednesday, the day after Sir Peter held a meeting on right to manage with representative leaseholder groups at Westminster.
LEASE was invited, but pointedly declined to attend, sending its reply that no one would be available to all the invitees.
Sir Peter conveyed his disappointment to the meeting. Last year, Sir Peter not only addressed the LEASE annual conference, but also visited the LEASE offices to meet its staff, whom he has praised.
This is the first time that he has questioned the purpose of LEASE, which is funded by taxpayers but has been encouraged to seek extra funding through commercial activities. In LKP’s view these have inevitably involved a corrosive relationship with the powerful vested interests in leasehold.
Meanwhile, the DCLG is considering a complaint about this year’s annual conference … from a senior managing agent.
Yet again it is being organised by the leasehold property managers’ trade journal News on the Block and sponsored by JB Leitch solicitors, JPC Law, SLC solicitors and Property Management Recruitment.
JB Leitch is a debt recovery outfit favoured by some of the more controversial freeholders.
“Having JB Leitch sponsor the LEASE conference is like the Citizens’ Advice Bureau being sponsored by Wonga!” said the managing agent.
Related posts:
Roger Southam should not be LEASE chair, leaseholder tells housing minister
Housing minister says LEASE must be on the side of leaseholders, and promises more money
Bottomley demands meeting over leasehold with Housing Minister Mark Prisk after LKP / Campaign against Retirement Leasehold Exploitation conference
Stop taking money from Benjamin Mire, Bottomley tells Leasehold Advisory Service
We are dissatisfied with the running of LEASE, APPG chairs tells housing minister
In my own experience, I can concur that LEASE ‘look’ for leaseholder issues and then base their commerical seminars to the trade on those very same problems that the unsuspecting leaseholders are having. Little do those leaseholders realise that everything they reveal will used in some seminar somewhere … to their detriment.
How can LEASE, which is funded by taxpayers/leaseholders, not turn up to a round-table discussion on their very own industy?
I think we should all be calling for this organisation to be scrapped as soon as possible. It is well past its sell-by date, and has just not moved with the times. I shall be putting that in my letter to the OFT investigation.
All the law firms mentioned are associated with the larger investor asset manager types and their infamous “letter before action” plus fees, in some cases whether or not the lease allows recovery.
I have said many times that LEASE does its work on the DL with phone person and email enquiries, and has a higher profitable profile with seinars webinars and conferences. I doubt that thre is material conflict of interst however it would be better if the advice section was in a seperate trust and the conference businsess in a not for profit that funds it, along with a leasehold tax via council tax- £1.50 a year (average) and thats £7.5 million quid( more if you include houses)- plenty to offer the service and webinars to RMCs RTMs etc.
and that I should proof read my posts – sorry.
AM
I disagree …
LEASE should do one or the other. Not both.
It has a clear conflict of interest and cannot be a prosecutor and a defendant at the same time.
But in the way that I suggest it is not inconsistent with providing unbiased free advice.. The advisors at LEASE are not involved in the seminar business. Moreover it is a distortion to only look at LEASE in the context of the “evil landlord”, when there are many small landlords, sometimes unwilling ones lumbered with a freehold as part of buying a home, who should benefit from LEASE’s advice too. In many instances that allows them to get it right for their neighbour leaseholders.
AM
I agree that freeholding landlords need a place to call to also get advice, but that is something they should pay for. Why does the british tax payer have to pay to help them run their businesses? If they need accounts doing, they pay for an accountant, if they need to sell or buy a property they employ a solicitor who specialises in that field. If they have bought a property that has tenants then they should have used a solicitor who specialises in Leasehold property law….
It is the home owning/reluctant landlords/leaseholders that are my main concern….
A lot of the people I speak to have never even heard of LEASE… yet all the managing agents and solicitors know of them! Why? Because they get an invite to all the seminars that are eing held.
I do not see the 5.5 million leaseholders in the UK being invited to any seminars.? And before anyone says it is down to cost, I do not believe for one second that leaseholders who are looking for advice would object to attending a meeting aimed at helping them.and paying a nominal fee to pay for the setting up of that meeting and costs associated with it.
When I get a spare minute I may just do that…
Because karen you are stuck in the rut of your own limited experience. if you re read the post you will see that I am referring to buildings where the residents like your run an RTM, or have bought their head lease or freehold or a party to the lease RMC, even a humlbe RTA. Waht of a 1 up 1 down where one or both own the freehold though they had no idea of what that was to them, it was tacked onto buying a flat?. The latter aren’t businesses, and while the others are, as not for profit schemes ( in the main) you are suggesting that they be excluded.
For those screaming for commonhold exactly the same issues will come up, forfeiture aside, but you cannot get advice from anyone except paid advisors.
AM
You are ‘assuming ‘an awful lot’ about my experience of leasehold…
I think it high time that a ‘buyer beware pack’ was issued with any sales literature for leasehold property to highlight the dangers of leasehold tenure.
It should be made mandatory to be given at the point of any inquiry by estate agents or auction houses etc and it should highlight the responsibilites of a leasehold purchase to ‘educate buyers’.
If all the relevent information is not then given to a prospective buyer then those selling the property should be held accountable.
That way buyers would be able to make an informed decision about whether to buy or not before having a valuation done or appointing a solicitor and having abortive costs to pay.
That pack should state who the landlords are.
Who the managing agent is and if they are connected to the landlords.
How to find out about who they would be paying ground rent and service charges to.
Then, if after doing their homework they still want to buy into that development they have made an informed choice.
I think once educated, more people will choose to buy on a development that is own and managed by the owners.
Most young/first time buyers have no idea what a leasehold property is and most solicitors do not inform their clients of the dangers of buying leasehold..
Can anybody explain to me how making government aware that they are funding a unique service for leaseholders and the leasehold sector is going to do anybody any favours?! There is only one possible outcome …. especially in these budget cutting times ….. and where will disadvantaged leaseholders go for advice then. Please think about the consequences of seeking to destroy a valuable free and impartial service provider.
Jeff,
Do you think we should carry on as before and pretend all in the garden is rosy. You think a government funded body should have supposedly impartial event sponsored by what in some instances is little more than a landlords debt collector?
Anyway perhaps we’re talking pots and kettles here. I read the IRPM submission to the OFT.
Jeff,
Forgive me for not replying earlier, I was spluttering in stunned shock, when you used the term “impartial”.
This impartial LEASE is the LEASE that threatened LKP/Campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation and their contributors, is it not?
It is the LEASE that still cannot decide if Benjamin Mire is suitable to receive money from?
Is this the LEASE that seeks funding from one of the most aggressive debt collectors in the country?
Is the LEASE whose “impartial” advice as to LVT costs nearly ended up with a leaseholder having his flat taken away?
Or is there another LEASE that I have not heard of?
Isn’t IRPM effectively merely the trade union of the so-called professionals responsible for the oppressive abuses of leaseholders?
When, after an immense struggle, we fired Peverel at our development I can say that the membership or non-membership of IRPM of anyone we interviewed was about as relevant the membership of their employer in ARMA (another “union” whose purpose is see off regulation and protect vested interests). If anything, membership in these bodies should be a disrecommendation.
The knowledge of the property manager of the law on section 20 procedures, party walls and all the rest of the arcana of property management and leasehold that might be examined is frankly irrelevant if the landlord or freeholder are monetising crooks and the property manager is merely “following orders” — that is if they aren’t themselves monetising crooks.
The Conservative Party has received six figure sums from the Tchenguiz Family Trust and has had historical associations with some of the largest landowners and landlords in the country. Powerful vested interests don’t want the boat to be rocked. You can read about London’s Laundry Business here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/08/opinion/londons-laundry-business.html
Leasehold, which has been justifiably abolished everywhere else that it inherited it from English common law, is simply riddled with corrupt practices — the reason for the OFT investigation in the first place. The question for IRPM is who does it wish to serve: leaseholders or the 1% who prefer the status quo? Suggestions that LEASE is doing an adequate job are simply laughable. Individuals yes, but at best able to say of some of the worst large landlords they also serve impartially “You might think that, I coudn’t possibly comment”.
The rest of us can certainly comment and l look forward the OFT and its successor getting some real data, not tendentious opinion from a servant to vested interests.
Jeff
I think you are somehow missing the point here and that is that Leaseholders do not feel that they are getting ‘impartial advice’ from LEASE because LEASE refuse to give advice and point leaseholders in the direction of a solicitor.
So, what exactly is it that you think is wrong with informing the government of the abuses WE the leaseholders are experiencing.
Have you got any leasehold properties that are run by greedy and corrupt landlords or managing agents ? Are you talking from your own experiences? because we are..
How can an an agency that was set up to protect leaseholders then also say it is protecting landlords in the same breath?
A debate is most welcome.
I agree with Karen.
Over the years I have never got any help or useful advice from LEASE except to contact the Citizen Advice Bureau. I have been told time and time again that they are unable to give certain advice since they are also working for the Landlords/Freeholders.
As far as I am concern LEASE is just a waste of taxpayers’ money in its current form.
I have to agree as Jeff, with all due respect to him, has never been a seeker of advice from LEASE. I have been genuinely shocked at the advice or lack of, not to mention incorrect advice.
The issue seems to fall not in bias as such, but that it provides an entry level or first principle level of advice well, but when it gets more complicated the quality can decline, and potential biases crop up. That’s why I ventured my suggestion above about reform.
Perhaps those with direct experience of this can express these in an anonymous fashion, replace names for A or B, and I am sure Jeff would listen and provide LKP and Campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation a basis for an article and lobbying.
In an ideal world… but unfortunately IRPM/ARMA etc. are not going to bite the hands that feed them…. If they do, I will stand corrected but I won’t hold my breath.
This site is the ideal platform to have an open and honest debate about Leasehold issues but nobody within those companies that have sprung up to earn a living out of leaseholders has yet risen to the challenge….the reason for this lack of enthusiasm is that the so called self-regulators are protecting their empires…
I have had reason in the past to contact LEASE myself (in the early days) and I too, like you was shocked at the level of knowledge that the call handlers gave me.
As a lay person, they could have sat me at a desk with a link to https://www.gov.uk/leasehold-property and I too could have answered any questions that were thrown at me on the spot.
I was constantly having to call back to get ‘other’ call handlers views as each were different in all cases. The only person who made any sense was Nicolas Kissin.
I found a high proportion of the call handlers very rude and abrupt and I had made a complaint which never even got acknowledged, needless to say that did not fill me with confidence…
Leasehold Law has too many ‘Grey Areas’ which is good if you are in the legal profession, as it will keep you in business… so they won’t want it changing/modifying…
What we need is an organisation that helps only leaseholders, where everything is kept confidential and not used as ammunition for the next managing agent’s ball oops conference.
The vast majority of the so called industry professionals subscribe to ARMA-Q / IRPM / ALEP etc. for legal advice don’t they?
Well ok, I see the logic of a leaseholders only service. But then if a leaseholder is a member of an RTM RTE or RMC, or a leaseholder who jointly owns the freehold of their Victorian conversion of 4 flats, are they to be excluded too?
Even if they want advice on getting say “section 20” right.
No, they would not be excluded……
Ok so your earlier comment of a service for leaseholders can no longer be your position and that LEASE shoud advise leaseholders including those that are in control of or own the building, but exclude landlords that operate as a business, for profit. That seems a broader basis on which to proceed with reform. 🙂
Quote “This site is the ideal platform to have an open and honest debate about Leasehold issues but nobody within those companies that have sprung up to earn a living out of leaseholders has yet risen to the challenge” Well I am…:)
On the “self protection” you also have to remember that agents find themselves acting gamekeeper, poacher, and the game itself, and therefore have a disparate role. Most agents are outside this particular group of the “Chengooz” empire and its vile asset management practices, and, from dismal to excellent ,serve the interest of the client, be it a dodgy dealer to large estates controlled by residents to one up one down and a little old lady who brings me a cake every Friday. ARMA etc was set up for managing agents, not asset managers.
AM
I think the short version of my reply is that you really have no idea what leaseholders are going through and you are just trying to justify your own existance in what ever form that is.
At least everybody knows who I am and I am not afraid to speak my mind or stand up and be counted. On the other hand, you hide behind a pseudonym, rather like a child calling names from behind a wall.
If you want to be taken seriously on this platform, then put your real name on your posts… if you dare 🙂
But Karen the short reply is that you are making enormous assumptions about me. In a public forum I have every right to want confidentiality, for none of the reasons that you assume or state. I know very well what leaseholders are going through, while very much in the sector, most of my work is helping residents take control and pick up the peices of disasterous management by freeholders(inc those who gert mentioned in this forum) and too often daft residents boards. In my “own life” I have helped groups in the pubic sector including relatives who have a council and an HA as landlords I have also exercised RTM and RTE, more than once, as well as assisting my best friend and his wife sue their former residents board who spent all the reserve funds on their block, (not the 6 blocks who paid into it) and sold up.
Putting my name to it makes no difference to that nor affects the broader perspective that I am trying to bring to the debate and not opne focused on a small part of the sector which doesnt represent the majority of residents problems or agents.
After all through discission you have reviewed your position on who LEASE should help.:)
But Karen the short reply is that you are making enormous assumptions about me.
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Karen:
I have never done that, merely encouraged you to be honest about who you are and what your motives are, because as I see it you are just stirring the muddy waters… but I think maybe you are protecting your own position in the leasehold old boys club….
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In a public forum I have every right to want confidentiality, for none of the reasons that you assume or state. I know very well what leaseholders are going through, while very much in the sector, most of my work is helping residents take control and pick up the peices of disasterous management by freeholders(inc those who gert mentioned in this forum) and too often daft residents boards.
In my “own life” I have helped groups in the pubic sector including relatives who have a council and an HA as landlords I have also exercised RTM and RTE, more than once, as well as assisting my best friend and his wife sue their former residents board who spent all the reserve funds on their block, (not the 6 blocks who paid into it) and sold up.
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Karen:
If you have feel that strongly that leaseholders of this country are being fleeced, then say so and not hide behind whatever industry you are in..
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Putting my name to it makes no difference to that nor affects the broader perspective that I am trying to bring to the debate and not opne focused on a small part of the sector which doesnt represent the majority of residents problems or agents.
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Karen:
You are missing the point yet again… it does matter that you put your name to it, as that means it is open… because how on earth are the OFT and the Government going to find all the complaints credible if we don’t. Do you think that you are the only one to have ‘something to lose’ by speaking out?…
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After all through discusion you have reviewed your position on who LEASE should help.:)
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Karen:
Please do not try and ‘close me’ because believe me on a face to face discussion you will never win….I have direct experience of leasehold abuse and you do not…
I shall invite you to the first leaseholder conference and we shall see who is the most credible…
You, like the rest or batting for both sides…
Karen Peel
I don’t need to disclose identity nor is about something to lose, fear, or indeed gain. I have been clear about my motives in what I have said. Openness and transparency are irrelevant as I am merely stating an opinion and putting out ideas– a broader perspective rather than a limited one.
It is there for people to think about.
Its not a question of how I feel, it is apparent in my posts that I see it as far from perfect and have made a number of suggestions, in line with my “motives” above.
I have not tried to close you, simply point out that after my response to your idea of “LEASE for leaseholders”, you replied “atlo”-ok fair point, we should do that but not, unintentionally, exclude resident owned or controlled freeholders or RTM and RTE etc”.
In respect to abuse then it is apparent you haven’t read my post except through your narrow perspective- I have experienced resident abuse personally and directly in my own life- try being told that the communal boilers need replacing when they were only brand new 8 years prior. Try being told that the lift floor interlocks were not available any more, 2 years after completion, and it would be £25k to fit new. Yet 4 days later I had a complete set of a brand new set, from the original lift manufacturer, on my desk @ £1000. I can provide more examples.
The batting for both sides just confirms what I referred to earlier, that there is just not two sides in the sector freeholder vs leaseholder, and my posts point that out
Well at least we can see that you have experienced leasehold abuse… I just hope that you and everyone else puts in their experiences and complaints to the OFT and copy in LKP/Campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation so that all have a record of what has been sent…..
Yes I put in lengthy response to them on the proposed scope and the current requests for submissions.
As I explained earlier I have also helped a number of groups who were in state of despair from abuse or ,as often, from their own failings and inertia.
But I do think that to be sceptical of input from those who have not “suffered abuse” is shortsighted as there is a concern that doing so narrows the wish list for reform. An example is the idea of LEASE for leaseholders which is commendable from one perspective, but on examination the unintended consequence is that residents groups are then excluded.
In this and other areas RTM becomes the landlord and RTE the landlord/freeholder. if you strip away forfeiture then that limits the rights to remedy non payment and other breaches and in many cases recoverability of costs, which only those participating have to bear. Commonhold and outright ownership will remove all abuses, right?, but in fact it strips a bunch of rights from flat owners replacing them with a vague notion of an ombudsman,when as those in the trade know owners, groups and individuals, can and do some very daft things.
My posts are to get people to think more broadly about issues and their consequences and not just the immediate problem in from of them. 🙂
In simple terms:
We all have to pay our share who ever is running the development… The difference is you either have control of the spending or you don’t. You can choose to get involved or you don’t. You can stick your head in a bucket of water and blow bubbles or you don’t… The vast majority of leaseholders want control over where/what their money is being spent on and what happens to their developments…
I can just imagine that in another 10 years time this country will have some of the worse slum developments in the western world… and believe me I see and get lots of reports on some terrible sites, as I am sure most people involved in leasehold reform do.
Landlords who are buying up the freehold sites now are doing it for a quick kill… they know the writing is on the wall and they will not spend anything that they do not have to…..
They know their days are numbered in developments with under 25% commercial units on them.
If you buy on a development with over 25% commercial space you have no rights whatsoever to either an RTM or RTE so DON’T BUY IT….
http://www.independent.co.uk/property/house-and-home/property/our-campaign-for-the-rights-of-leaseholders-may-lead-to-a-new-law-9146842.html?origin=internalSearch
Quote: The difference is you either have control of the spending or you don’t.
I agree, however you dont have to throw out leasehold in whole or in part to achieve that. That just opens Sadly the existing rights are insufficiently complex. In a +25% development, historcially residential parts were often given a head lease of their bit to look after it- RTM could do the same. RTM in turn could be taken out of the adversarial Tribunal determination and be made by the panel independantly on applciation, accepting submissions from either parties
Quote:
“RTM in turn could be taken out of the adversarial Tribunal determination and be made by the panel independantly on applciation, accepting submissions from either parties.”
Why not just give all leaseholders the automatic right to manage their own blocks from day 1? Then there would be absolutely no need to go to any sort of panel for an application with a begging bowl? as in my experience the ‘panel’ just drag out for as long as they can and make sure all their buddies earn a fair crust!
The only losers in all of this is the leaseholders yet again…
Quote- “Why not just give all leaseholders the automatic right to manage their own blocks from day 1?”
Thats what I have suggested earlier in this topic thread and in others. it then means that you don’t need commonhold if you limit or remove forfeiture.
You do then have to look at leasebacks eg housemanager flats etc as some wag might think of Price + £x per flat plus £y for the company share in the residents freehold company as it will get a valuable assett.
Begging bowl, or big stick, is not relevant as you have to deal with existing set ups. Where a freehold or other interst has value, contrived though they may be, there is never going to be legislation that allows the automatic right without compensation on exisitng schemes.
In any event what I am suggesting is eliminating any idea of a begging bowl because the determination of RTM is then independant ( perhaps along side the exisitng process to be chosen by the applicant). RTM is triggered by the applicant as an automatic right, and determinanation either independantly or by the FTT only arises where the landlord objects and the RTM chooses either method.
I am amazed that after all the abuses, rip offs, all kind of created charges such as consents for cats, dogs, windows, bathrooms e.tc. fees of £120 ( an example: a form from E&M to a Solicitor asking questions such as “do you pay service charge or maintenance, how long you have lived in the property and so on. yet all the information is already known to Estates & Management some stated in the Solicitors letter) for requesting a Lease extension. E & M stated in a previous letter regarding a request for a consent: “We work very closely with our clients OM Property Management and Proxima …”
Lies, even bulling, poor sometimes non existence services, the list could go on and on.
Yet there seems to be still in some quarters need to hang on to the backwards medieval Leasehold.
I just cannot understand it. This is 21st Century and there are many worthwhile, respectable jobs in this country if there is a worry loosing jobs because of abolition of the antiquated Leasehold!
I can honestly say if I have known what is the Lease,” marriage value, 120 years yet just over 30 years one have to purchase an extension to 120 years Lease. the Leaseholders pay for absolutely everything including Solicitors fees and the freeholders/landlords absolutely nothing for the upkeep of the properties I would have NEVER purchased a Leasehold property.
But in turn thats what your solicitor used to be paid to do and advise you on what you are buying, and adjust the price if required. Sadly it is not simply the evil landlords but the appalling drop off in service from solicitors, but in the main, the increase of conveyancers, who take a very restricted view of their role- convey the property and assume the purchaser has made an informed choice. When even agents go glazed eyed when asked about lease length, the purchaser, you, from day one is on the back foot if they don’t do their homework. Or as so often happens they fail to read the explanation and risks that ARE highlighted. What ever reforms occur in the future, for now and in the future leases will still exist.
I am sorry Mystified to hear of your plight but you are not alone but some of the blame has to be shared by innocent and careless buyers, those that take advantage ( or as colleague says financially and mentally “rape” ) them and a conveyancing market cut to the bone for low price fixed fees leading to the mindless form filling conveyancing warehouses on industrial estates.
“or as colleague says financially and mentally “rape”………………
What an interesting analogy of what the legal profession think of their ‘clients’……. and one that should be born in mind when next appointed a solicitor or a conveyancer..
The difference is whether, as in their case, they choose not to get involved or represent those type of clients or people.. There is nothing wrong with charging for a service at a sensilbe proportional fee, but not for nothing in the case of common parts leases staff flats etc.
There is no justification for when you you are put in a position of trust with upkeep and people’s money, to feel that you can not only add on costs commisions etc, but engineer deliberate exploitation fraud and theft. It is that sort of behaviour that led to the description above.