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With a range of pressures squeezing margins, residential estate and block managers need to generate additional revenue streams. Building on the fact that customers are demanding higher levels of service, providing additional resident services would seem the obvious solution.   In this webinar, find out how block managers are using modern systems to both improve levels of service and branch out to generate revenue by providing value-added services to residents. Webinar | 10:00am - 10:45am | 28 June 2017

Abbatt Property Services, a property recruitment agency, have announced the launch of a new service called ‘Dual Management’. Aimed at Property Management Companies, Residential boards, and Developers who manage staff in the residential property sector, Dual Management is an outsourcing-of-staff solution. This solution allows Property Managers to focus on managing properties while Abbatt take care of hiring & managing on-site property staff, HR compliance & employment liability, and all administrative tas

QUESTION Could you please let me know if more than one Section 20 Notice can be issued in any financial year without contravening the regulations. We would like to amend our RA constitution to reflect our current ways of working, as the existing one has not been adhered to for several years (5 – 8). Any advice would be very welcome. We would like to adopt a simpler more modern way of working. ANSWER Section 20 (of the Landlord & Tenant Act 1985) relates to consultation for either major works or qualifying

QUESTION Please could you let me know if I have to pay the management company to extend the Lease of my flat when I own a share of the freehold? ANSWER Many thanks for your query. Leases are extended either by private treaty (i.e. agreement between the parties) or pursuant to statute. Subject to meeting the qualifying criteria, you are entitled to extend your Lease by following the procedure laid out under the 1993 Act. This does require the payment of a premium, although premiums can vary wildly dependin

In Elim Court RTM Co Limited –v- Avon Freeholds Limited [2017] EWCA Civ 89 the Court of Appeal has come to the rescue of an RTM company in respect of “trivial defects” in the process of exercising the right to manage. What is the right to manage? The Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002 (“the Act”) gives long leaseholders of dwellings a statutory right to acquire management responsibilities in place of their Landlord via an RTM company. The main aim of the legislation was to allow tenants to acquire r

What to do when enfranchisement is not taking off? What if half of the long leaseholders wish to participate, but the other half do not. In the case of a block of 90 flats having 45 or even 50 flats ready to participate may not be sufficient, because those participating need to fund the cost of buying the reversions of the non-participating flats, and any development value in the building. The sums involved may be substantial and this can prove a stumbling block.  In the meantime the lease terms get short

Serving notices has always been a tricky business. The emphasis on getting it right is ultimately a balancing act between what ‘black letter’ compliance might demand and that which the reasonable layperson might expect common sense commerciality to dictate. This case is interesting, as it really does seem to push the envelope of how wrong you can get it, but still get it right. That is not to say that it is proposition for the suggestion that all and any faults in a notice can be forgiven, but it does sho

Introduction This commentary considers some practical problems that can arise following the exercise of the right to manage (“the RTM”) because the landlord continues to own elements of the building. The RTM provisions of the Commonhold & Leasehold Reform Act 2002 (“the 2002 Act”) gives leaseholders of flats a statutory, no-fault, right to take-over the management of their building without the expense of buying out the freehold and any superior leasehold interests. Unlike a collective enfranchisement, whe

QUESTION Does democracy tilt the scales of justice? I am writing about the lessee of a flat in a building converted into four flats. The freeholder/lessor is a property management company limited by shares and guarantee (which is also the residents association). She has a share in the company and is a director. This is equally true of the lessees of the other three flats, all are on a par. The accounting was badly muddled over a period of years but has now been sorted by a qualified accountant. It shows t

At some point, all property managers have to deal with Party Wall matters, but not all are as familiar with this area as they could be. In fact, not all surveyors are completely on top of it, but at EK McQuade, we specialise in Party Wall matters. EK McQuade is the product of a merger last year between the Party Wall specialists at McQuade Property Consultancy and the Party Wall side of Earl Kendrick Associates, renowned for our specialist knowledge of property management, particularly in residential bloc

Ten years ago (April 2007) tenancy deposit schemes were first introduced in England and Wales. You need to go a little further back to understand why they were brought in, though. Rewind to June 1998 and the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux (NACAB) published a damning report based on CAB clients’ experience of getting their deposits back from landlords. NACAB researcher Liz Phelps reported that as many as half of all private tenants who paid a rental deposit “may have experienced their depo

QUESTION Can you provide some information regarding sinking funds?  Can they automatically be instituted by a head lease or must provisions be provided in the sublease?   ANSWER Many thanks for your question. It is common for leases to allow the landlord to collect sums of money from leaseholders to create a sinking fund. This allows sums of money to be built up, which will then be used to cover the costs of irregular and expensive works.  The process avoids the “spikes” that would otherwise occur when th