Freehold estates
What are freehold estates?
Unlike other residential areas, freehold estates are privately owned or mixed tenure estates which are not owned or maintained by the local council. The effect is that the owner of this land is responsible for the costs of maintaining and repairing the area, and these costs can be sometimes known as ‘rent charges’.
Homeowners that own property on freehold estates are therefore required to make regular payments towards the cost for maintaining areas within the estate, for example public roads, play areas and communal gardens within the estate. The homeowners will split the cost with other homeowners by contributing a proportion of the overall cost to the management company
How do I know if I am required to pay rent charges?
If you are a homeowner of a freehold property within a freehold estate you may be required to make such contributions.
Your purchase contract or transfer document when you purchased the property will set out any obligation to contribute such costs for maintenance of the freehold estate.
Government guidance on freehold estates
The government intends to support homeowners of property on freehold estates by improving legislation to:
- allow homeowners on freehold estates to challenge the reasonableness for such costs they pay to managing agents;
- allow homeowners the right to appoint or replace the managing agent if they are unhappy with how the freehold estate is managed;
- require management companies who do not employ managing agents to belong to a redress scheme;
- allow homeowners to manage the freehold estate themselves.
If you would like any more information relating to this article then please feel free to contact me via telephone – 020 8221 8073, via email here, or visit my profile here.
This is not legal advice; it is intended to provide information of general interest about current legal issues.
