If you bought a leasehold property, you may not realise that your lease has a rising ground rent clause before it’s too late. An increasing ground rent clause could mean that your annual ground rent doubles every 10 years, costing you thousands of pounds through the life of your lease.
The lease can cause issues when you want to sell the property, as it can reduce the value of your property, and could leave you with a property that’s unsellable.
The leasehold ground rent problem could have been avoided if your Conveyancer or Solicitor had told you about the issue with your lease before you bought it.
You can take action and get your lease sorted. You can avoid doubling ground rent and ensure that your property’s value is restored by making a ground rent claim against the Conveyancer or Solicitor who dealt with your property transaction.
Robert Godfrey
Partner, Head of Professional Negligence and Dispute Resolution
Read Robert's Full ProfileCase Study: £13,000 Compensation for Leaseholder in Ground Rent Claim
Why Choose Simpson Millar?
- We work closely with the National Leasehold Campaign and we’ve successfully dealt with leasehold claims for leaseholders who own Taylor Wimpey and Bellway homes
- We’ve carried out free lease health checks for hundreds of people who’ve got in touch with us about the leasehold scandal and have successfully taken cases to the Court of Appeal
- You get a free, no-obligation lease health check. We can tell you whether you’ve been affected by the leasehold scandal. If we think you could make a successful leasehold claim, we’ll tell you what your next steps should be.
What is a Leasehold Property?
A Leasehold property differs from a Freehold property (where you own the property and the land it sits on) in that the ownership of the property is for set period as defined by the lease.
This ownership can be subject to a number of restrictions in the use of the property with rents and fees being paid annually or when alterations are requested.
In effect you are “renting” a space. At the end of the lease, the property passes to the Freeholder.
Ground Rent Issues
There are a number of issues with owning the leasehold on a house or a flat and paying ground rent. These include:
- Increases in ground rent and service charges
- Adverse rent clauses making properties unsellable
If you’ve been affected by any of these, you’re probably feeling very let down by your Solicitor or Conveyancer. They should have advised you about these potential ground rent issues when you were buying the property and told your mortgage lender about any increase in ground rent, and the impact this could have on your property’s value.
To understand more about the issues with rising ground rent, watch our video which should explain it simply for you.
Leasehold Ground rent clauses explained
National Leasehold Campaign
The National Leasehold Campaign was set up in response to the leasehold house scandal, which came to light in 2017. It’s still affecting many leasehold property owners today.
We’re proud to work with the National Leasehold Campaign to support anyone affected by a leasehold or ground rent scandal. Many people who’ve been affected bought new build houses from the following developers:
- Taylor Wimpey
- Bellway Homes
- Persimmon Homes
- Redrow
If you’ve been affected by any of the above leasehold property scandals, you could make a claim to get some of your money back.
Get in touch with one of our Professional Negligence Solicitors today for free legal advice.
Proud Supporters of the National Leasehold Campaign (NLC)
Simpson Millar are proudly working in partnership with the National Leasehold campaign, an organisation set up to campaign for the abolition of residential leasehold in England and Wales.
By supporting this campaign, we are helping individuals who are caught up in the leasehold scandal to help ensure people affected receive the legal support they need.
For more information, visit the National Leasehold Campaign website.
What is the Ground Rent Claims Process?
- Get in touch with one of our Professional Negligence Solicitors who can help you. There’s no obligation and it’s free.
- Get your free lease health check. We’ll download a copy of your lease, assess your situation and tell you whether you have a claim for compensation.
- We’ll ask for your Conveyancing File – this will let us review what your Conveyancer or Solicitor did and help us with any claim against them.
- Push Your Claim Forwards – we’ll start the claims process once we’re happy that you have a strong claim. It should take around 12 to 18 months to complete.
Get in Touch
If you think your Solicitor or Conveyancer didn’t tell you about a rising ground rent clause in your lease, we can help you and we could deal with your claim on a No Win, No Fee basis. Just ask us for details.
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Download our Leasehold Pack – Help and Advice
We’ve put together a free, straightforward Leasehold pack to help explain the leasehold scandal and offer you some advice. For more information and download instructions please visit our Leasehold Legal Guide Download.
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Simpson Millar Solicitors are a national law firm with over 500 staff and offices in Bristol, Cardiff, Lancaster, Leeds, Liverpool, London and Manchester.