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Okay so here's the deal: My partner and I are in the process of selling our flat. We have one of a building of eight flats. We are in a management company as the maintenance and general running was devolved to the management company by the freeholder in 1989. We subsequently took onboard a property management company to do all of the day to day stuff, hiring cleaners, getting quotes for painting and decorating, general upkeep. As part of the agreement with theproperty management company we have to have annual general meetings. At the last one of these it was revealed by the head of theproperty management company that we need to increase our monthly service fees from £50 - £100 as 'you need a new roof' and as this was likely to cost in the region of £25-30,000 it was time that serios thought was given as to how this would be paid for. There had been no survey of the roof to arrive at this decision up to this point. As the minutes of the meeting constitute a legal document (at least that is how we had it explained to us), prior to the minutes being published we asked that the minutes be updated to include the clause that no survey had been performed on the roof. This was duly added to the minutes. Let me just add that there have been no tiles / slates deposited in the garden – just like the rest of the street after these two storms we have experienced this week!
Fast forward to November and we had managed to secure a buyer, I believe he is after a quick purchase as he has asked “can you get out quickly”. The conveyance process starts and at first, we don’t hear anything. Then, we receive an email from our solicitors handling the sale stating that the buyer was concerned about being hit with a bill for a new roof after completion / when the time would arise. We were devastated, the first instinct being that we were going to lose the buyer. We arrived at what we thought was a solution via our Estate Agents in that we could instruct our solicitors to hold a percentage of the sale for a number of years and if the roof was repaired then the buyer could use these retained funds. The estate agent gave us the names of two local roofing companies so that we could get a survey done. The one we opted for was quite rude and performed the survey based on some photographs that we had procured when one of our neighbours had been up checking the roof. Our solicitor agreed but also did add that we might not need to do this. The offer was put to the buyer in principle who likewise agreed. So, by the third week of January we had a quote to say that the roof only required remedial work currently but would need to be replaced in roughly five to ten years. This was submitted to our buyer’s solicitor who then disappeared from the face of the planet!
For after two weeks of apparently no news we contacted our solicitor – who was in fact a paralegal under the supervision of a solicitor, we were eventually informed that the person handing the buyer’s process had left the business three weeks previously and all subsequent emails sent from our paralegal to the buyer’s team would have to be re-sent (I work in IT and do not know why this had to happen, the email account must still exist or else an error 550 would have been issued at the time of the send) so whoever had access to the former employee’s email would have been able to read the emails sent from our side. Other apparent issues arise from the fact that someone from the buyer’s side requested that our legal team send the roof evaluation to our property management team. I do not know what purpose this would serve as still nobody in an official position as a roofer has set foot on the roof in order to evaluate the thing.
So, here is where we are now: our buyer cannot be found, he’s touring Wales or something like that. Our paralegal is still insistent on saying that we might not have to enable the retention fund for the roof – something about a freeholder absentia policy? Our estate agent has pledged to do all of the communicating between ourselves and our paralegal as we do not get along. We are desperately worried that all of these delays (even though the buyer’s solicitor leaving has nothing to do with us) are going to make the buyer simply look elsewhere. Moreover, we have paid fees to our legal team in order for this process to be undertaken, are these refundable if the sale fails? Our mortgage in principle / offer has until May but God I hope this is resolved way before then.
On a none-legal front, we are in mental hell. I am in counselling for mass anxiety attacks and what I would term as manic behaviour seeking solace in alcohol. My partner is bearing the brunt of everything, but she is not made of stone and sooner rather than later this is going to take its toll whether we lose the buyer or not. People say that moving to a new house is in the top three life stressful events…and that’s with a competent solicitor handling everything. I seriously do not know what the buyer’s team are doing.
Fast forward to November and we had managed to secure a buyer, I believe he is after a quick purchase as he has asked “can you get out quickly”. The conveyance process starts and at first, we don’t hear anything. Then, we receive an email from our solicitors handling the sale stating that the buyer was concerned about being hit with a bill for a new roof after completion / when the time would arise. We were devastated, the first instinct being that we were going to lose the buyer. We arrived at what we thought was a solution via our Estate Agents in that we could instruct our solicitors to hold a percentage of the sale for a number of years and if the roof was repaired then the buyer could use these retained funds. The estate agent gave us the names of two local roofing companies so that we could get a survey done. The one we opted for was quite rude and performed the survey based on some photographs that we had procured when one of our neighbours had been up checking the roof. Our solicitor agreed but also did add that we might not need to do this. The offer was put to the buyer in principle who likewise agreed. So, by the third week of January we had a quote to say that the roof only required remedial work currently but would need to be replaced in roughly five to ten years. This was submitted to our buyer’s solicitor who then disappeared from the face of the planet!
For after two weeks of apparently no news we contacted our solicitor – who was in fact a paralegal under the supervision of a solicitor, we were eventually informed that the person handing the buyer’s process had left the business three weeks previously and all subsequent emails sent from our paralegal to the buyer’s team would have to be re-sent (I work in IT and do not know why this had to happen, the email account must still exist or else an error 550 would have been issued at the time of the send) so whoever had access to the former employee’s email would have been able to read the emails sent from our side. Other apparent issues arise from the fact that someone from the buyer’s side requested that our legal team send the roof evaluation to our property management team. I do not know what purpose this would serve as still nobody in an official position as a roofer has set foot on the roof in order to evaluate the thing.
So, here is where we are now: our buyer cannot be found, he’s touring Wales or something like that. Our paralegal is still insistent on saying that we might not have to enable the retention fund for the roof – something about a freeholder absentia policy? Our estate agent has pledged to do all of the communicating between ourselves and our paralegal as we do not get along. We are desperately worried that all of these delays (even though the buyer’s solicitor leaving has nothing to do with us) are going to make the buyer simply look elsewhere. Moreover, we have paid fees to our legal team in order for this process to be undertaken, are these refundable if the sale fails? Our mortgage in principle / offer has until May but God I hope this is resolved way before then.
On a none-legal front, we are in mental hell. I am in counselling for mass anxiety attacks and what I would term as manic behaviour seeking solace in alcohol. My partner is bearing the brunt of everything, but she is not made of stone and sooner rather than later this is going to take its toll whether we lose the buyer or not. People say that moving to a new house is in the top three life stressful events…and that’s with a competent solicitor handling everything. I seriously do not know what the buyer’s team are doing.
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