Case Law

The service charge provisions in leases of holiday chalets were to be construed as requiring the tenants to pay a fixed charge of £90 at the beginning of the term of the lease, increasing annually or triannually by a 10% compound, despite the high charges which would be incurred by the end of term.

In a service charge dispute, the landlord failed to provide invoices to establish the cost of significant works that had been undertaken.  The FtT found that it had not made out its case and awarded nothing in respect of the works. 

A FtT failed to provide sufficient reasons for its decision on a service charge dispute.  However, the matter would not be remitted as the tenants had admitted the sums in question and so the FtT had no jurisdiction to hear matter.

The RTM company carried out a s20 consultation procedure in respect of works that it proposed to carry out to the roof.  The tenants challenged the procedure adopted by the RTM company. 

 A collective enfranchisement initial notice that is served in accordance with Chapter 1 of Part I of the Leasehold Reform, Housing & Urban Development Act 1993 (“the 1993 Act”) remains in force and is therefore binding on the recipient reversioner unless and until the occurrence of one of the three events prescribed by section 13(11) of the 1993 Act.

The Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002 creates a right for the appropriate proportion of qualifying leaseholders of flats in a self-contained building or part of a building to establish a “right to manage”. This case establishes that a Right to Manage Company set up for this purpose can only acquire the right to manage a single building or part of a building.

The council was not entitled to recover a proportion of lightning maintenance costs incurred under a city-wide contract where the costs varied depending upon the number of call-outs and there was no evidence as to what extent, if at all, the costs related to the estate on which the subject property was located.

The FTT had erred in finding that the cost of insurance was unreasonable because it had failed to have regard to whether the lessee’s quotation was comparable to the insurance obtained by the landlord.

The right to manage cannot be exercised by a single RTM company in respect of more than one self-contained building or part of a building.

There was insufficient evidence to justify a finding that costs totalling more than £55,000 per leaseholder for the replacement of windows and cladding were reasonable or reasonably incurred.  

The FTT had not erred in striking out a s.27A application made by successors in title to determine an issue which had already been determined under the same lease in earlier proceedings to which they were not party for being an abuse of process.

The LVT (as it then was) had exceeded its jurisdiction by making a management order allowing the manager to re-let a commercial unit and to collect rent in respect of the same. It would have been preferable for the manager to approach the landlord for a contribution towards the costs of the provision of services in the first instance. The terms of management orders should be proportionate to the tasks which the tenants are entitled under their leases to ask the landlord to perform.