Retrospective consent to lease on repossed property

[tonyf77]

Hi was wondering if anyone could help me. I am having problems selling my property. I bought the house as a repossession. The Bank’s Solicitors could not locate a Landlord for the property so took out indemnity insurance. After moving in the property I started receiving letters from a Property Management Company who act on behalf of the Landlord request payment for ground rent. This was paid in full on time and is up to date.

I am now selling the property and the Property Management Company are saying that they cannot find any record of being approached for granting consent for the assignment or charging of the property as required under the terms of the lease.

The ground rent portfolio is in good order however the licence to assign and licence to charge are missing from the file and this would suggest that there have been breaches of the covenant relating to the relevant transactions.

We are being advised we cannot sell the property until this is sorted out and are told by our solicitors that we have to apply for a retrospective consent to lease the property. In addition the indemnity insurance we have taken out apparently doesnt cover this situation and so any fees we incur from a solicitor to write and sort this out we are not covered by the insurance.
Would anyone know how much this retrospective consent is likely to cost us , is there a standard fee? Is It up to the landlord/ property management company? Is it appropriate to write to the management company ourselves as we feel we are getting nowhere with our solicitors? Any help would be greatly appreciated as we are frustrated beyond belief. We feel we have done everything we were advised to from day one.

thank you

[JK0]

Consent to lease? Is it let at the moment?

If tenant has left, there is no longer any consent needed.

[tonyf77]

Consent to lease? Is it let at the moment?

If tenant has left, there is no longer any consent needed.

sorry , maybe I wasnt clear. I am living in the property. we have not let it out to anyone else. Our solicitors says we have to apply for a retrospective license to live there from the landlord as one was never arranged at the time it was bought as a repossession. This is despite us paying ground rent to a property management company each year, and being up to date with said rent. They say we need to get this before we can proceed with the sale of the house. However we are getting no information from our solicitors on how much it will cost, or the timeframe involved to obtain etc.

[ram]

how much it will cost, or the timeframe involved to obtain etc.

Cost, no more than £35 for them to write a letter confirming their approval to assign the lease to you, and at the same time to send another letter in the same envelope ( or maybe a few weeks later once they know who the purchaser is ) giving you permission to assign the lease to the new purchaser

Time frame ---- 20 minutes.

All above is assuming you have been a good boy, don't owe any service charges, have not breached the lease on anything else.

Sounds like you have been there a few years ?

If that is the case, then tell the Man Co / freeholder that they knew you had bought the lease, and have accepted for x- number of years and x months that you live there and have the lease, they have already, via accepting payments and it has not bothered them ever before, that by accepting payments from you they have granted you permission to live there under the terms of the lease.

Otherwise they would have been on to you saying "Who are you ? why are your sending us this money for ground rent and service charges, and we return your money as you have no right to live here, and we don't know you"

Tell then not to be so stupid. All you need is authorisation to sell the lease to a respectable person.
( they may forget about the retospective consent, but that's a money grabbing idea that they wont want to dispence with.)
Look at your lease to see how much it states for a licence to assign. Leases don't always state that, as it come as an "all in" on sales of flats from freeholder.

So- £ 35 and 20 minutes, is your answer -- for straight forward - no complications - assignment of lease.

[tonyf77]

Thanks ever so much for your reply. You've given me hope this will be Morestraightforward Than our solicitors have had us believe. youve also given me good content for a letter to them.