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Leasehold enfranchisement: ownership condition

United Kingdom
15/04/2009
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The Courts have provided welcome clarification of the ownership condition.

The Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 gives the holders of long residential leases of flats the right to extend their leases by an additional term of 90 years. In July 2002 the residence test was abolished and replaced with an ownership condition. In order to claim an extended lease an owner must have been the qualifying tenant of the flat for the two years leading up to the service of the notice on the landlord claiming a new lease. The period of ownership is measured backwards from the date the notice is given. The issue before the Court was a novel one, namely whether the start of the period is the date on which the owner purchased the lease or the date on which the purchase was registered at the Land Registry. In practice there can be a significant difference between the two. In this particular case it was over 3 months. Recorder Rosen QC, sitting in the Central London County Court, held that the date of registration at the Land Registry was the operative date. In giving his judgment he considered that the right answer was clear and that to construe the qualifying condition otherwise would damage the operation of the Act and create the risk of having more than one qualifying tenant at any one time, something the Act expressly prohibits. We acted for the successful claimant.

Law: The Wellcome Trust Limited v Nazli Baulackey, unreported, 6 April 2009, CC (Central London).

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