London property

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If you are buying a new house in UK, avoid UK builders offering you any house under leasehold title.

https://www.todaysconveyancer.co.uk/news...perty-trap

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UK Leaseholds are giving problems if the buyers cannot get a mortgage:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...homes.html

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More on UK Leasehold problem reported in The Guardian Newspaper :

www.theguardian.com/money/2017/may/16/leasehold-uk-homeowners-ground-rents

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Yesterday ( 7 Nov 2017) in UK Parliament, Justin Madders MP presented first reading of his bill to deliver leasehold reform to simplify the cost of freehold enfranchisement :

https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/20...holdReform

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Big changes coming - no ground rent to pay on future new property :

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017...wn-feudal/


https://www.theguardian.com/money/2017/d...-practices

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Copied from UK Guardian Newspaper 13th Jan 2018.

Thousands of young homebuyers remain trapped in virtually brand-new homes made unsaleable by spiralling ground rents and abandoned by developers such as Taylor Wimpey, despite a ban on the charges promised by the government.


Read more
Guardian Money can also reveal that the £5bn John Lewis pension fund is behind the soaring rents that have made the lives of some homeowners a misery.
Nathan Stewart, 27, contacted us after the sale of his home in Soham, Cambridgeshire, fell through last month. His buyers had agreed to pay £175,000 for the detached coach house, built by Taylor Wimpey in 2011, but the deal collapsed when their lenders refused to grant a mortgage against the property. The reason? Taylor Wimpey sold the house as leasehold, but with a clause whereby the ground rent doubles every 10 years. It’s currently £300 a year (a fee for which no service is provided) but, over the life of the remaining 109 years of the lease, Stewart says it will spiral to an extraordinary £307,200 a year. If Stewart and his wife Tasha stay in the home to retirement, they will be on the hook for annual payments of £9,600 a year, and possibly £19,200.
Many banks now flatly refuse to lend against properties with these doubling leases, making them effectively unsaleable. “We feel like we’re now prisoners in our own home. We’re also about £2,500 out of pocket after the sale fell through,” says Stewart.

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2018/j...rs-charges

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UK Law Commission consulting the public on commonhold starting from 22 Feb 2018 :

Commonhold
Commonhold was introduced in 2002 as a new way to own property in England and Wales. It allows a person to own the freehold of their individual property (such as a flat) within a building or development and become a member of a “commonhold association” which owns and manages the shared areas.

By enabling the freehold ownership of flats within a residential block of flats, commonhold provides an alternative to leasehold.

Commonhold may also be used in a commercial context, for instance to regulate relations between individual shops in a retail park or offices in an office block.

Very few commonholds have been set up since the existing law came into force.

Our 13th Programme consultees told us that there are a number of issues within the current commonhold model which could make it unattractive to homeowners, developers, mortgage lenders and others across the wider property sector.

The Government has announced that it wishes to reinvigorate commonhold. Our project will therefore look at why commonhold has failed, and what changes can be made to the current law to make it an attractive and workable form of ownership.

Our 8-week call for evidence on commonhold law is now open. We welcome views.

https://www.lawcom.gov.uk/project/reside...ommonhold/

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The UK Law Commission is calling for evidence on Commonhold :

https://www.leaseholdknowledge.com/wp-co...idence.pdf

See if you can answer the 10 Questions as some of you may have strata property in Australia and can make a contribution:

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In yesterdays's announcement, the UK Housing Minister is to crackdown on rogue managing agents and introducing a new regulator for leasehold complaints :

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-c...homeowners

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The UK Law Commission reported on 27 April 2018 receiving 140 responses . :

https://www.lawcom.gov.uk/leasehold-law-...s-hopkins/


Following the Law Commission’s 8-week call for evidence on Commonhold a full consultation paper is expected later in 2018. The Commission received more than 140 responses to its call for evidence and heard from around 20% of existing commonholders.

On enfranchisement, the Commission will publish solutions for leasehold houses before summer recess 2018, followed in September by a detailed consultation on a new enfranchisement regime in respect of leasehold houses and flats.