When Right to Manage Isn't the Answer: Understanding Section 24 Tribunal-Appointed Managers

But it is not always the right answer.

Not every leaseholder group wants to run a building. Not every situation calls for residents to take on the governance, financial oversight, contractor management, compliance responsibility, and day-to-day operational burden that comes with self-management.

Sometimes the issue is not who holds the management contract. It is that management has broken down altogether.

That is where Section 24 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 becomes relevant. It remains one of the least discussed remedies available to leaseholders, yet in the right circumstances, it can be one of the most effective.

What Section 24 actually does

Section 24 allows the First-tier Tribunal to appoint an independent manager to take over the management of a residential building.

This is fundamentally different from RTM. Leaseholders do not become the managers. There is no company to form. No directors to elect. No operational burden to absorb.

Instead, the Tribunal appoints an independent professional with clearly defined authority to step in and run the building. The scope of that appointment — what the manager can do, what they are responsible for, and for how long — is set out in the Tribunal order itself.

For many leaseholders, that distinction matters enormously. They want better management. They do not want to become managers.

When is Section 24 relevant?

The situations where this remedy becomes appropriate tend to share some common features.

Essential repairs left unaddressed for months. Service charge accounts that lack transparency or basic structure. Compliance obligations that have been neglected. Budgets that bear no relation to actual costs. A landlord who appears absent. A managing agent that has lost the confidence of residents entirely.

In some buildings, the deterioration is more gradual. Trust erodes slowly. Strategic decisions do not get made. Financial controls weaken. Communication stops. The building continues to function, but only just.

And sometimes the dysfunction sits not with the landlord or managing agent, but within the resident management structure itself. An RTM company or residents' management company that has become deadlocked, or where internal conflict has prevented meaningful decisions from being taken.

In all of these scenarios, leaseholders can feel trapped. Many assume their only options are to tolerate the situation or pursue RTM. Section 24 offers a third path.

The key difference from Right to Manage

RTM is a no-fault right. If the qualifying criteria are met, leaseholders can assume management control. They do not need to demonstrate that anything has gone wrong.

Section 24 is different in a fundamental way. It is a fault-based remedy.

Leaseholders must persuade the Tribunal that intervention is justified. That means evidence is central to the process. Documentation of failures. Records of correspondence. Evidence of financial mismanagement, compliance gaps, or unreasonable neglect.

That makes the application more involved than RTM. But it also makes it particularly valuable in situations where the problems are serious, where independent oversight is what is needed, and where self-management is either impractical or simply not what leaseholders want.

What powers does the appointed manager have?

That depends entirely on the Tribunal order.

Typically, the appointed manager may take on service charge budgeting and collection, financial administration, repairs and maintenance, contractor appointments, major works management, compliance administration, insurance, lease enforcement, and general operational management of the building.

But the scope is tailored to the circumstances. If the issue is primarily financial, the order may focus there. If it is compliance, the powers may be broader in that area. The Tribunal retains discretion.

This is not an unlimited takeover. It is a structured intervention, designed to address specific failures while protecting the legitimate interests of all parties.

Is it expensive?

That tends to be the first question.

Tribunal proceedings do involve professional input. Evidence gathering, legal advice, preparation, and the possibility of opposition from the landlord all carry costs.

But that calculation changes when compared with the alternative. Prolonged poor management generates its own costs. Escalating arrears. Deferred maintenance that becomes emergency repair. Compliance failures that carry legal and financial consequences. Deteriorating asset values that affect every leaseholder.

The more useful question is often not whether action has a cost. It is whether inaction costs more.

Why this remedy is underused

Section 24 does not receive the attention it deserves.

Part of that is because RTM dominates the conversation around leaseholder rights. Part of it is because tribunal processes feel unfamiliar or intimidating to many leaseholders. And part of it is simply that many people do not know the option exists.

That is beginning to change. As buildings become more operationally complex, as compliance expectations rise, and as leaseholders become better informed about the rights available to them, the demand for credible intervention mechanisms is growing.

Not every leaseholder group wants to run their building. Not every problem calls for residents to take over. Sometimes what is needed is not control. It is competence. And sometimes the most effective route to competent management is not taking it into residents' hands. It is ensuring it ends up in the right independent hands instead.