March 29, 2024

‘If I fail to offend anyone, I will do it next time,’ Bottomley tells appalled LEASE conference

Leasehold sector insiders were aghast at the address given by Sir Peter Bottomley on Wednesday at the Leasehold Advisory Service “annual conference”. The event was packed with surveyors, valuers, lawyers and property managing agents paying £350 a head to attend what has until now been the most important trade show of the sector. Earlier housing […]

57% of leaseholders regret buying their property, finds Leasehold Advisory Service

And two-thirds of leaseholders don’t feel they get a good service from their managing agent These are two of the results of the survey of leaseholders – and RMC directors –by the Leasehold Advisory Service. According to the LEASE website, the leasehold survey “is a tool designed to support the sector and not a commercial or […]

Campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation and LEASE thank DCLG civil servant for helping leaseholders

Campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation and LEASE jointly held a party last night to thank Paula Hassall, a DCLG civil servant, for her contribution to helping leaseholders. Paula was appointed to the leasehold section 13 months ago and helped bring about significant improvements to the leasehold sector. Sadly, she leaves at the end of this week to […]

Re-energised LEASE annual conference 2015

A re-energised and confident Leasehold Advisory Service held its LEASE annual conference 2015 in central London last Wednesday. It was a gathering of some of the brightest – perhaps most socially engaged – of the players in the professional leasehold world: lawyers, surveyors, property tribunal judges, property managers. For the third time – and it […]

Roger Southam is new chairman of LEASE

… and Countrywide executive appointed to the board (which means there is still no representative of leaseholders) The colourful property manager Roger Southam, of Chainbow, is today announced as the new chairman of the Leasehold Advisory Service. Mr Southam, a chartered surveyor, founded Chainbow but sold out most, perhaps all, its residential management contracts to Trinity […]

LEASE chairman Deep Sagar told: sack ‘disgraced and disgraceful’ Benjamin Mire or sack yourself!

Sir Peter Bottomley has told the chairman of the Leasehold Advisory Service Deep Sagar to stop advertising the services of  Benjamin Mire – or resign. And the LEASE executive can go with him, the veteran MP adds. Mire, the chief executive of Trust Property Management based in Colindale, north London, is a chartered surveyor who […]

Prisk to Bottomley: what’s the evidence that the Leasehold Advisory Service is not ‘balanced’? Well, how about this for starters …

Housing Minister Mark Prisk has rounded on Sir Peter Bottomley to demand why he believes that the Leasehold Advisory Service in not ‘balanced’. Sir Peter, the Tory MP for Worthing West, made his comments in the Commons on April 16: “To have clever lawyers, some of whom will appear at LEASE—the Government-approved agency for giving […]

Leasehold Advisory Service denies seeking ‘bungs’ to pass on leaseholders for professional services

LEASE, the Leasehold Advisory Service, is a taxpayer-funded quango, so why on earth is it asking solicitors and others whether they would be prepared to pay referral fees to be put in touch with the distressed ordinary leaseholders who call up for advice? Referral fees – or ‘bungs’ as they are less politely termed – […]