Shingles negotiates substantial reductions in landlords statutory costs in addition to premium payable.

Considerable additional savings have been made, in addition to those negotiated on the premium payable, in respect of the landlords’ reasonable statutory s33 | s60 statutory costs.

A saving of over 30.5% was negotiated off Grosvenor’s statutory costs in respect of a collective claim for the freehold on a block in Mayfair at the turn of the year.

Earlier this month, a reduction in excess of 18% was negotiated off Cadogan’s statutory costs in respect of a lease extension on a small basement one bedroom flat in Chelsea.

It is worth solicitors informing the client seeking an extended lease |  freehold not to agree a mortgage offer too soon in the process in order to allow time for these final negotiations to be made. After all, a tenant has a period of 4 months within which to complete once all terms have been agreed including the landlords costs.

Frustratingly one client fell unwittingly into this trap and suddenly found himself under a rushed deadline to agree the premium on his lease extension in order to not loose his mortgage offer which had to be drawn down by a certain date. As a result he accepted the landlords quoting statutory costs rather than run the risk of delaying settlement for possibly quite a few months in order to secure ‘a quick deal’ to argue the point along with a further reduction in premium.

Happily the ‘quick deal’ premium agreed was already under target.