You can’t please all of the people all the time

It is impossible to please all of the people all the time, and indeed it is impossible to please some people any of the time. This is human nature and if people didn’t have different opinions on matters then there would be no need for lawyers and courts!

No-one has a monopoly on knowing everything, and it then becomes a question of those who want to work together consensually and those who don’t.

Of course when it comes to leasehold and all matters on communal living, there needs to be a desire to want to respect neighbours, and live in harmony and with tolerance.

I have lived in flats for over 16 years now and I do not regret a moment of buying leasehold. In fact I bought a leasehold flat to live in six years before I turned my business from commercial managers to residential managers.

LEASE has just concluded a survey with Brady’s, and the results make interesting reading: 57% of leaseholders regret buying leasehold.

That is a pretty strong statement, and a sad indictment that needs drilling into.

This work is currently being undertaken, but let us just explore what this could mean and what could be at play.

You will have heard people say they hate their jobs, when in reality one particular person is making life difficult.

Generalisation and extrapolation are a fact of human interaction and nature.

However, when it comes to the survey and hating leasehold there are a number of factors that could be at play.

Has someone not realised when buying they would pay a service charge? Have they not realised there is ground rent? Do they have noisy neighbours? Have they been refused to make alterations? Well, in reality some of these items are a factor of communal living and nothing to do with leasehold.

We will have seen programmes on neighbours from hell, and this can occur in freehold houses as well. Service charges will need to be paid whether the flat is leasehold or owns a share of the freehold – or even the holy grail of commonhold.

Whether it is in England and Wales or anywhere else in the world, flats can cause problems for the occupants and owners because they are forced into communal living.

It doesn’t suit everyone, and for those investors owning buy-to-let flats, it is a whole different perspective. Have costs not been budgeted that means the profits are not what they were thought to be?

Some would say leasehold is broken. I genuinely believe leasehold is not broken. We need to improve the service and skills of the property managers, we need to educate the public to know what to expect with leasehold and the constraints and the obligations, and we need to ensure that everyone on all sides works together transparently.

At LEASE we are making strides to improve our service delivery, improve our education tools and improve the leasehold market.

The team is committed and dedicated and provides a wonderful service for all.

Roger Southam is Chair of the Leasehold Advisory Service