Freehold co. blocking sale after service charge debacle and CCJ?

Reply to the comment left by Kate Mellor at 09/07/2018 - 21:57
Thank you very much Kate. A logical factual and legal argument. Which like you ve said most of the other responses have "missed the point". My calculations are I owed nothing until the compliant demands in my name were issued in 2013, this figure was £4,500 approx which I ve paid off already.
The CCJ was flawed as they (RMA or Freeholder) or their solicitors must have been asked at some point, had they provided the correct compliant demands and followed the correct procedures for the debts. They had not and yesterday the Director of the Freeholder Co. admitted they hold no documentation from 2005-10 and they offer of £3,000 as FF settlement can not be verified or calculated as they have no accounts to quantify this figure. Wtf ?!?!

Many thanks once more Kate, great morale booster.

Reply to the comment left by David Atkins at 10/07/2018 - 00:00
I did have a UK address, the property in question, they did not contact me there in 8. EIGHT years!!!

Reply to the comment left by trevor white at 09/07/2018 - 12:52
Hello Trevor and thank you for what appears to be a constructive query. Sorry I missed you out in the flurry of replies to comments.

About 4 years has passed since the CCJ was issued. Upon first being aware of its issue I immediately contacted all parties concerned. But the law firm acting on behalf of the Management Co. tried (successfully) to scare me into paying with the forfeiture of my lease, when I challenged them to its validity. Saying the CCJ had already been entered and time had passed to raise any objections. He was partially correct, but obviously he's not going to help me with any advice that I could have had it set aside.
Similarly it took the Management Co 3-4 months to email me copies of the summons and relevant paper work.
Working in Iraq made matters a bit tricky, as I only returned home 2 or 3 times a year.
As I first said in my initial post, I was green to leasehold (no excuses) having only bought the flat following my wife passing away in 2004 and the sale of our house to provide for our children with their lives and family.
I have never had any dealings with County Courts before either.
I returned to the flat every six months for a few weeks, as I private person I very rarely seen or spoke to my neighbours, they all seemed busy, young professional sorts.
Anyway Trevor perhaps this may help with your prognosis, yesterday the Management Co. contacted me to say the have no documents, SC demands, letters, accounts etc dating after 2010. So this means they can not prove they ever provided me with invoices or demands for the first 5 years.
I think this bodes well.

Many thanks,
BB

Reply to the comment left by dave collum at 09/07/2018 - 21:16
Cheers to Dave Collum, yes I have quoted and referenced this Act, also Section 19 Limitation Act of 1980, which if I am not mistaken has a Statue Barr of 6 years to reclaim debts. But perhaps some one might correct me regarding Leases?

Thanks again,
BB

Reply to the comment left by BB at 10/07/2018 - 03:34
Prompt for the purposes of setting aside has no definition. Each case turns on its own facts/merits. I would say that if you have without reasonable excuse once you learned of the CCJ, delayed matters for more than say 14 days you will struggle to convince a Judge.
Judgement would have been obtained as you stated in default. There would have been no proof of compliance with pre -action protocols required.
You may be able to show that you have a real prospect of success but it may be that you are deemed to be too late.
The statutory limits will apply and so will any restriction on title passing (land Reg) relating to non compliance /breach of lease. I am aware of the points of non valid SC etc but this will have to be argued and won.

Negotiation is the way forward here, legals will prove costly and lengthy.

Sorry Trevor, so what you are saying is the RMA and/or Freehold Co. could have employed a solicitor to apply to the County Court to obtain a CCJ for payment, or possibly even done so themselves, without ever having to provide proof of arrears, or qualify that there was a debt, the debt was bonfide and that they had followed all the prescribed procedures (LTA) and taken reasonable steps to request payment from the debtor (PreAction Protocol).
Non of this required scrutiny by the Court or the solicitor prior to Judgment?
Wheres the fairness and justice here?

That’s about the size of it B.B. the court relies on your response to their letters to object within the specified date if the debt is not owed. If you don’t respond the creditor will receive judgement by default. That is in effect the purpose of the option to set aside a judgement, in instances where the documents were sent to an incorrect address, or the debtor was out of the country, or in hospital and was unable to defend themselves or make a counter claim.

I’d suggest that you get a referral to a good leasehold solicitor. Even if their only purpose is to sift through all the evidence (along with the wording of your lease) and advise on the best way forward. These guys hav a stronger position at the moment because they have a CCJ against you; you have a valuable asset at risk; AND you have time pressures in that you want to sell your property which they are in a position to prevent. They kind of have you over a barrel as unsavoury as that is, you are best to be pragmatic and unemotional in your decisions.

Check your BTL building insurance policy, mine all have legal insurance as standard. If yours does then contact your insurer to commence a claim. That should pay for your legal bills to defend your position. Your other option is no win no fee. It’s not just dodgey ambulance chasers offering this, even good firms (the larger city ones) offer this if they deem you have a winable case. They’ll at least give you an assessment of your position, even if they don’t want to move forward on that basis though, so worth the time.

It sounds as though they have gone straight for an MCOL in County Court and not taken this via the FTT (which I would avoid if at all possible, just due to the expense and time factors), personally what have you got to lose from an attempt to get the CCJ set aside in the county court? It’s a simple form! Delving into the world of the First Tier Tribunal is over complicating things if they haven’t gone down that route in my opinion.

If you get a hearing turn up with ALL your evidence and a good bullet point summary and let them present their evidence and the judge can decide how much you owe. ASSUMING they accept your application at this late stage, but if you don’t try, you won’t know...

Reply to the comment left by Kate Mellor at 11/07/2018 - 07:51Thanks again Kate. As I said I was indeed overseas can prove this and I still am as an Expat retiree.
The Freeholders/RMA did not even know about their CCJ against me.....nor even that they used a Solicitor back in 2014.
They made £1448 as offered in FF settlement, until a switch clicked on and they were alerted to my sale, also then my solicitor asked about having the CCJ marked as "satisfied".
This they soon withdrew, what I thought was a reasonable sum as this is what they CAN provide accounts for, ie. during their tenure 2010 onward.
To be honest Kate we are arguing over£1500......Oh and a principal. The later of which don't carry any credence nor value in the UK no longer, I m very sad to say. Hence I m selling up.
Thank you most kindly for your time, advice and help.

Reply to the comment left by BB at 11/07/2018 - 11:23
Leasehold is an absolute nightmare these days judging by what I read on here! I wouldn’t touch a leasehold flat with a barge pole now sadly. You either get large managing agents/freeholders taking over/buying up and looking to make as much money from charges as they can by hook or by crook, with a very muddled tribunal not seeming to do a good job at fairly resolving disputes or enforcing judgements; or in smaller blocks with a management company shared by leaseholders you get some power-crazed megalomaniac ensuring they get themselves appointed director (not hard as let’s face it who among us wants extra work) and turning the place into their own mini dictatorship! No thanks.