At last

Labour to cap ‘legalised extortion’ of ground rents and end leasehold houses … Opposition and government now compete to reform leasehold

The four-year campaign of the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership to reform leasehold has taken a surge forward this week. Today Labour said that it will cap charges that leaseholders pay in ground rents, and set out a plan to end leasehold houses in new developments. Meanwhile, government this week consulted with senior sector figures who have […]

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Fill in our survey to demonstrate the new-build ground rent scandal

All leasehold owners affected by onerous lease terms and ground rents are invited to fill in the following survey. The information will be used to demonstrate to civil servants and politicians the scale of the problems facing leasehold home owners, whether of flats or houses. It is extremely important that decision makers are presented with […]

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Guardian sticks with new-build ground rent scandal, while LKP advises Persimmon home buyers to walk away

By Sebastian O’Kelly (This article is bylined in order to declare an interest as the author is a shareholder in Persimmon and Barratt) If Taylor Wimpey, Persimmon, Bellway and other developers playing the angles of leasehold thought the row over cheating ground rents would go away, they must be disabused by now. Today The Guardian […]

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Sajid Javid vows to ‘stamp out abuses’ over leasehold that make homes unsellable

Leasehold properties and the onerous ground rents that make them unsellable were raised in the Commons this afternoon. As half new properties are now leasehold, Sir Peter Bottomley urged the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government to work with stakeholders to prevent abuses “to ensure that ordinary people buying their first home do […]

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Sunday Times reports Taylor Wimpey ground rent scandal, as executives meet leaseholders

The Taylor Wimpey ground rent scandal featured in the Sunday Times yesterday, as it emerges that executives are being sent out to visit the complaining leaseholders. The article was in the form of a reader’s letter from a £130,000 leasehold house owner in Bolton facing doubling ground rents from an initial £250. Garry Evans says […]

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End lease extension ‘injustice’, veteran MP urges Commons

Sir Peter Bottomley told the Commons yesterday that leaseholders are overpaying for their lease extensions and called on the government to end the “injustice”. The veteran MP, who is patron of LKP and co-chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group, strongly criticised existing methods to value short leases – almost all of which were commissioned […]

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Last year: £64.8bn leasehold properties sold. £13.7bn was new-build. Developers make £300-500 million a year from ground rent sales

Land Registry data shows the scale of the leasehold market ¬ and reveals the importance of freehold sales to housebuilders. Research by the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership shows that £64.8 billion of leasehold sales were registered in 2015. £13.73 billion of that was new-build residential property. From this information, we can roughly estimate the level of […]

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Taylor Wimpey ground rent explanation ‘not true’, BBC is told

The Taylor Wimpey ground rent scandal featured on BBC R4’s influential You & Yours programme yesterday. But its explanation that doubling ground rents compared to those linked to RPI amounted to “slightly less than 1% of the average sales value of the property” was dismissed as “not true”. The programme interviewed first-time buyer Clair Scott, […]

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Ban revenue-generating leasehold houses, says Justin Madders MP. Redrow responds

Labour MP Justin Madders has demanded a ban on the building of leasehold houses where there is no justification for them. Leasehold houses have proliferated as housebuilders exploit the housing crisis to make extra revenues by selling off the freeholds, often to shady investors based overseas who hide behind nominee directors. Worse, some housebuilders – […]

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The All Party Parliamentary Group now has 51 members

  Current members: 51 Listed below are the current members of the All Party Parliamentary Group looking into Leasehold and Commonhold issues. This page is updated as new members join. If your MP is not a member of the APPG yet, please fell free to encourage them to join. They can contact either us at […]

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Sunday Telegraph says ‘New homes, yes, but not leasehold’

The Sunday Telegraph today questions whether the government’s £3 billion boost to house building should be for leasehold houses and flats. Further measures are expected to be announced on Wednesday. The article, by Fleet Street veteran Liz Hodgkinson, writes: “In spite of attempts to reform the sector in revent years, critics say it is getting […]

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‘New-build ground rent scandal could spark legal battles,’ says Guardian

Lawyers have contacted the Guardian newspaper to say that buyers of new-build houses and flats with crippling ground rent clauses could take legal action. The full article can be read here  Graham Balchin, of solicitors Carter Lemon Camerons says: “It is a requirement of most lenders [see the CML Handbook section 5.14.9] that the lender […]

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Taylor Wimpey CEO says doubling ground rent scandal under ‘review’. But Bottomley asks: ‘Have innocent homebuyers been shafted?’

This afternoon Pete Redfern the CEO of Taylor Wimpey has responded to the All Party Parliamentary Group on leasehold reform saying that the issue of homeowners with doubling ground rents is under “review”. Mr Redfern’s full letter is below. He points out that the doubling ground rent leases, which LKP is aware apply to leasehold […]

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Telegraph reports ‘marketing cobblers’ of 999-year ‘virtual freeholds’ with lethal ground rents

The Daily Telegraph website has reported the issue of eye-watering ground rent multiples sold to homebyers by mainstream developers. Louie Burns, of Leasehold Solutions, offered the example of flats in Islington, north London, where grounds rents starting at £250 per year per flat would grow over the term of the 999-year lease to… £68,719,476,736,000. Mr […]

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LKP poised to mine information on leasehold, after being admitted to Open Data Institute

LKP is delighted to announce that it has been accepted onto the Open Data Institute’s start-up accelerator scheme. This is a very prestigious accolade. Of the 83 applications for the scheme, four were accepted  The ODI was co-founded in 2012 by the inventor of the web Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Sir Nigel Shadbolt, an authority […]

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Bottomley tells Taylor Wimpey to explain ‘sharp practice’ ground rents – and asks for names of directors who approved them

Sir Peter Bottomley (right) has demanded that Taylor Wimpey explain its “unfair ground rent” provisions to the All Party Parliamentary Group on leasehold reform. Yesterday he told fellow MPs at the APPG meeting chaired by Jim Fitzpatrick, Labour MP for Poplar and Limehouse: “The ground rent increase may have been legal. It is clearly undesirable. […]

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Pete Redfern: Stop pontificating about the housing crisis and sort out the ground rent scandal of Taylor Wimpey’s own making

This morning Pete Redfern, Taylor Wimpey CEO, was on the Today programme (BBC Radio 4) discussing the housing crisis. This afternoon MPs are demanding he explain a housing crisis of Taylor Wimpey’s own making: building leasehold houses and flats where ground rents double every ten years. This has left first-time buyers with homes that they […]

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Carlex and AgeUK reject Law Commission draft on exit fees

Law Commission backs developers over huge exit fees, and dumps OFT qualms over ‘likely’ unfair contract terms What began as an exercise supposedly to help pensioners and their families facing exit fees in retirement properties has ended up with the Law Commission backing the charges. The Law Commissioner Stephen Lewis met Carlex / LKP last […]

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