{"id":149800,"date":"2025-03-13T22:22:30","date_gmt":"2025-03-13T15:22:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/a-two-tier-housing-market-will-be-the-result-of-labours-half-baked-leasehold-reform-plans-harry-scoffin\/"},"modified":"2025-03-14T02:18:59","modified_gmt":"2025-03-13T19:18:59","slug":"a-two-tier-housing-market-will-be-the-result-of-labours-half-baked-leasehold-reform-plans-harry-scoffin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/a-two-tier-housing-market-will-be-the-result-of-labours-half-baked-leasehold-reform-plans-harry-scoffin\/","title":{"rendered":"A two-tier housing market will be the result of Labour\u2019s half-baked leasehold reform plans | Harry Scoffin"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nThe current system in England and Wales is iniquitous, but the answer isn\u2019t to divide flats into shiny new-builds v leasehold debt trapsThe leasehold system in England and Wales has needed tearing down since the medieval era. It locks homeowners, especially those in flats, into an exploitative, serf-like relationship with the freeholder who owns the property and management rights to it.The freeholder can exploit this power imbalance and, with the backing of the law, coerce the leaseholder to pay extortionate sums in ground rent and service charges. The former is a payment conferring no benefit or service to leaseholders, it is owed as tribute to the freeholder\u2019s superior legal rights. Historically a trivial amount, ground rent has been gamed in recent years to extort more money from individual leaseholders. So destructive are ground rents that in 2022, parliament passed a law banning them on new homes.Harry Scoffin is a housing campaigner and the founder of Free Leaseholders Continue reading…
\n
\nSource : theguardian.com
\nRead more…A two-tier housing market will be the result of Labour\u2019s half-baked leasehold reform plans | Harry Scoffin<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The current system in England and Wales is iniquitous, but the answer isn\u2019t to divide...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-149800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-property-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p75ss1-CY8","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":141376,"url":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/freeholders-living-off-rentier-structure-with-exorbitant-ground-rent-mps-say\/","url_meta":{"origin":149800,"position":0},"title":"Freeholders living off \u2018rentier structure\u2019 with \u2018exorbitant\u2019 ground rent, MPs say","date":"January 19, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"\r MPs questioned freeholder groups in committee hearing over leasehold reform billMPs have laid into freeholders for creating a \u201crentier structure\u201d in England and Wales in recent years, charging \u201cexorbitant\u201d ground rents of \u00a38,000 a year in some cases, as a freeholder group pushed back against proposed changes to leasehold\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Property News"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":136604,"url":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/what-is-leasehold-and-are-there-any-alternatives\/","url_meta":{"origin":149800,"position":1},"title":"What is leasehold, and are there any alternatives?","date":"May 11, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"\r Cladding crisis highlighted issues as leaseholders ask government to facilitate commonhold systemPlans to abolish \u2018feudal\u2019 leasehold system in England and Wales dropped Given that they have paid large sums for their homes, leaseholders might be surprised to find that they are in a landlord and tenant relationship with the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Property News"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":80778,"url":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/freehold-of-worst-leasehold-abuse-block-sold-for-180000\/","url_meta":{"origin":149800,"position":2},"title":"Freehold of 'worst leasehold abuse' block sold for \u00a3180,000","date":"February 23, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"\r Anonymous buyer picks up right to collect soaring ground rents on Blythe Court flats from freeholder MPs described as crookThe freehold to a block of flats in Birmingham regarded as the worst example of leasehold abuse in the country has been snapped up by an anonymous buyer for \u00a3180,000.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Property News"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":140159,"url":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/lets-abolish-leasehold-an-antiquated-and-unfair-system-observer-editorial\/","url_meta":{"origin":149800,"position":3},"title":"Let\u2019s abolish leasehold, an antiquated and unfair system | Observer editorial","date":"November 5, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"\r It\u2019s simply a money-making scam that allows landowners to exploit those who have bought their own homes\u2018This system is not business, it is blackmail,\u201d Lloyd George said of leasehold in 1909. More recently, it has been described by Rishi Sunak as \u201ca scam\u201d when he was a junior minister\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Property News"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":148107,"url":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/our-flats-rising-ground-rent-is-going-to-ruin-our-move\/","url_meta":{"origin":149800,"position":4},"title":"Our flat\u2019s rising ground rent is going to ruin our move","date":"November 12, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"\r Our buyer\u2019s lender has pulled out because the charge rises with the property\u2019s rising value. Now the delay risks collapsing the whole chainWe found a buyer for our leasehold flat, but on the day of exchange their lender declined to offer a mortgage, despite having previously agreed in principle.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Property News"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":31252,"url":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/property-news\/property-is-theft-well-leasehold-certainly-is\/","url_meta":{"origin":149800,"position":5},"title":"Property is theft? Well, leasehold certainly is","date":"October 22, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"\r Ground rent ... sparking seedy practices for which there is no ethical basisIt beggars belief that there can be clauses in a property contract which allow a freeholder to backdate the ground rent and then present an extortionate bill to the unsuspecting buyer of a flat. That we can\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Property News"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149800"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149800"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149800\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":149801,"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149800\/revisions\/149801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.siamlandbank.com\/propertynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}