Leasehold Freeholders - do they ever deal with anything? I'd dearly love to name and shame, but
I don't often post by asking a question, but this one needs attention being drawn to it. Having only ever owned freehold properties, until four and a half years ago, I was none the wiser about the dreaded "freeholder" and their antics, when it came to owning a Leasehold property. That is, until such time as my husband and I decided to delve into the market of Buy-to-Let Property. Don't get me wrong, we are far from loaded, I can assure you on that point, but when re-negotiating our mortgage deal around four and a half years ago, we, more or less on a "whim" decided to release some equity to make what money we had work for us a little more...
At first, things seem to move along swimmingly. Thanks to a friend of my mother's, we had tenants from two days after owning it, had learned the ropes of being a landlord from various internet searches and conversations with some estate agents we had been dealing with, in respect of the sale of our own home. So, though we had to ensure there was a Gas Safety Certificate and a Part P Electrical Certificate, we were off and running. Due to not having to hunt around for a tenant (which to be honest would have taken no time at all to find, due to the property having been fully renovated internally) we elected to manage our tenants ourselves.
Then around a year later, issues started to occur. We already knew that the Freeholder of the property that our BTL Leasehold flat was a part of owned the rest of the Leaseholds, as well as the freehold itself, but had considered this might be beneficial to us due to only having to deal with one person, but how wrong we were... That first issue was a water leak from the flat above our Ground Floor one, which poured through the ceiling of our BTL hallway, via a light-fitting. Thankfully, our tenants spotted it first thing and due to it involving electrics the Managing Agents who dealt with the letting of the flat above (on the Freeholder's behalf) came racing. I had to drop everything and attend myself as our tenants were both working, so did said Managing Agents. The leak was dealt with (though I did receive a parking ticket, which thankfully I was later able to avoid paying, due to the Managing Agents confirmation, by letter to the Council).
Having said that, our hallway light fitting was removed and taken away, leaving little or nothing in it's place and the whole area needing time to dry out. I learned a lot about water leaks from that very first occurrence, which is that, despite them being made good, once things have been given time to dry out, the damage resurfaces and needs further attention at a later stage. Next came a leak from the kitchen of the flat above, which was above the kitchen in our BTL flat. Initially, our tenants said nothing to us about this. That remained the case until they spotted that there appeared to be mushroom growth on the ceiling from said water leak. It was at that point I contacted the freeholder, having only just been advised myself, and he arranged to meet me at the property. It was at that point, or shortly afterwards, that I learned quite what a shark he was. He talked the talk, It's a lave and plaster ceiling, it needs time to dry out before anything can be done, the leak had occurred some six or more months ago and had been rectified, this portion of the ceiling needs removing and replacing with new board and then making good and so the excuses went on.
Firstly, he later admitted that the leak was due to the worktop of the kitchen above not having been sealed properly, which he said he was going to deal with by buying a new worktop and having it fitted. Six months later, he was still making excuses, though around eight or so months later sent a man round, who merely re-decorated the ceiling (none of the other items the freeholder had stated, not only in front of myself, but also one of my parents, were dealt with). Suffice to say, less than a month later, the whole lot reappeared on the ceiling more aggressively than it had initially. From that point onwards,I seemed to be persona non grata, as far as that freeholder was concerned. Thankfully, as I had kept our tenants advised of what I was doing in an attempt to have matters dealt with, we didn't lose them as tenants.
The next and final leak was the worst, at least as far as our tenants were concerned. Firstly, I received a phone call on the evening of my birthday, while driving back from having spent an afternoon and early evening with my family, at a restaurant in Maidstone. If you have a chance to go there, by the way, its a converted barge on the river Medway and the food was lovely. However, I digress.
This time, due to it being a Sunday evening, I had no choice but to contact the Managing Agents of the flat above's emergency number, particularly having arrived and discovered that stagnant water was pouring through the ceiling of our BTL flat's bedroom ceiling. That Managing Agent knew nothing of what he spoke about when he attended, which I subsequently checked with an Insurance Assessor. Firstly, the reason behind the stagnant water was that the tenants who then occupied the flat above had accidentally knocked a pipe connected to an old boiler, which had been replaced to another part of the property, but the old one never removed, hence water that had been sitting there for well over 20 years, came pouring through.
Not only that, but the Managing Agent who attended, whom I've since discovered was the owner of the Management Business, insisted that we pierce holes in our own ceiling, to allow the water to flow through more swiftly, stating that if we didn't do so then none of the repairs would be covered by the insurance company. What you have to bear in mind in this instance, is that the ceilings in our BTL property were still the original Victorian ones, with ornate coving and ceiling roses and it was around the coving area that the leak occurred. We were horrified that he was telling us to poke holes in the ceiling, but have to say he was pretty convincing, not only to us, but our tenants as well. It was only later that I discovered he was talking a load of bull. Not only that, but as soon after as he could, he (the then Managing Agent) stopped conversing with me about repairing the damage from that leak, thus leaving me to the mercy of a freeholder who had decided to ignore every last email I sent him at that point. Don't get me wrong though, I didn't hound him, bombard him with emails or anything. He just decided I wasn't worth his time.
So the upshot is, the freeholder never did make good on any of those leaks from his flat above, particularly the last on, as he did absolutely nothing in that regard. In order to sell that property, after our tenants left to purchase their own property, we had to send someone in to rectify all the issues from the water leaks, which resulted in over 40 hours of work being carried out. I have on a number of occasions advised the freeholder that we had had to do that, due to his refusal to do anything himself and yet to this very day, we have not received a penny from him by way of compensation.... though a bill has been sent to him, one original letter and bill, delivered by hand and followed up twice via email... and so we wait...
On the plus side, we did eventually sell that property and, due to various surveys which had been carried out, the Freeholder was at least galvanised into action as far as the exterior of the building was concerned. As mentioned, we'd had a number of issues dealt with at our own cost, as otherwise the property would have been hard to sell, but it that money we are waiting for from that Freeholder, who has even threatened to take us to Small Claims Court. He failed to provide an invoice for completing legal paperwork (not even sure he could charge for that, but according to our conveyancer it was up to us whether we paid...) on the day of completion of that sale, which was his own error. At the time of a property sale completion, all invoices, if they are outstanding and have been agreed, should be provided, so that those can be settled on that day.
At some point, once my printer has a cartridge, I shall update this post to add details of the redacted letter that my husband and I hand delivered and sent via email to that Freeholder...(having been a legal secretary for almost ten years, before becoming an author, I'm not lining myself up to be sued - though this account is what happened, rather than the fabrication that the freeholder spouted at the time of each leak, as far as how he would deal with those is concerned, and I have a Court bundle at the ready!)
Redacted letter below...
What occurred, as far as the lengthy process to sell our BTL property, can wait for some other time...
