Hi guys,
I have an odd situation and after going to my solicitor for advice on the lease and being told she only does the basic selling and is not a lease expert, I found these forums and wanted to see if anyone could help.
We have a small one bedroom flat on the High Street in South West London. The flat itself is over a fast food establishment (KFC) although the free holders have just evicted them so it now sits empty. We tried to sell the flat to a first time buyer but 2 sales have fallen through due to the fact they couldn’t get a mortgage as it was above commercial. We then asked the estate agent to try and find a cash buyer and they did. The flat is on market for 190k, we accepted an offer for 175k. The new buyers wanted to rent the flat out as an investment.
The problem came when a clause in the lease was found (we really didn’t know it was there) by the buyers solicitor. In short it says the owner of the flat is not allowed to rent the flat out. Clause below:
The Lessee shall not at any time during the term hereby granted underlet the whole of the Demised Premises.
The freeholders are a family and in short very nasty people. They tried to bully us into selling the flat to them when we first started the sales process but seemed shocked when we refused to sell it to them for half its value. We have also paid them a large amount of money to extend the lease as it was a little low (70 odd years). That was a long and drawn out process and we nearly had to go to tribunal.
We asked them if they would remove the clause and they would not. Under advice from out agent we asked if they would accept a deed of covenant into the lease that gives them £350 per year and makes sure the renter abides by rules of the lease but they wouldn’t do that either. Their official line is selling the flat will not be as often as putting in renters and the clause protects them from this.
We now seem to have run out of options. First time buyers can’t get a mortgage on the flat and investors can’t rent it out. My girlfriend is pregnant and so we are desperate to move out as she soon will no longer be able to navigate the entrance stairs. Has anyone come across this before or know anyone who could help. Funds are now limited as we spent them on extending the lease. Any help would be extremely appreciated.
J.
I have an odd situation and after going to my solicitor for advice on the lease and being told she only does the basic selling and is not a lease expert, I found these forums and wanted to see if anyone could help.
We have a small one bedroom flat on the High Street in South West London. The flat itself is over a fast food establishment (KFC) although the free holders have just evicted them so it now sits empty. We tried to sell the flat to a first time buyer but 2 sales have fallen through due to the fact they couldn’t get a mortgage as it was above commercial. We then asked the estate agent to try and find a cash buyer and they did. The flat is on market for 190k, we accepted an offer for 175k. The new buyers wanted to rent the flat out as an investment.
The problem came when a clause in the lease was found (we really didn’t know it was there) by the buyers solicitor. In short it says the owner of the flat is not allowed to rent the flat out. Clause below:
The Lessee shall not at any time during the term hereby granted underlet the whole of the Demised Premises.
The freeholders are a family and in short very nasty people. They tried to bully us into selling the flat to them when we first started the sales process but seemed shocked when we refused to sell it to them for half its value. We have also paid them a large amount of money to extend the lease as it was a little low (70 odd years). That was a long and drawn out process and we nearly had to go to tribunal.
We asked them if they would remove the clause and they would not. Under advice from out agent we asked if they would accept a deed of covenant into the lease that gives them £350 per year and makes sure the renter abides by rules of the lease but they wouldn’t do that either. Their official line is selling the flat will not be as often as putting in renters and the clause protects them from this.
We now seem to have run out of options. First time buyers can’t get a mortgage on the flat and investors can’t rent it out. My girlfriend is pregnant and so we are desperate to move out as she soon will no longer be able to navigate the entrance stairs. Has anyone come across this before or know anyone who could help. Funds are now limited as we spent them on extending the lease. Any help would be extremely appreciated.
J.