When selling a leasehold property, particularly in a professionally managed block of flats, the managing agent needs to supply information that is required by the buyer’s solicitor and will charge a fee for doing so. This fee varies but it usually amounts to a few hundred pounds. However, once the managing agent has received payment, there is no guarantee as to when the information will arrive and sometimes this can slow down the progress of a leasehold sale.
The Government has recently published its consultation for tackling the leasehold system and, amongst other proposals, it intends to impose a new regime that will impose a turnaround time of no more than 15 days on the managing agent to provide the necessary information and will also set a maximum fee of £200 plus VAT for providing it.
Once introduced, the measure should go some way to help speed up sales of leasehold flats.
