UK Landlord Forum / Life

We've let out a leasehold property for a number of years without any official consent to let agreement in place.

However, we're now in the process of selling the property and at the 11th hour the buyer has requested a consent to let agreement - they won't proceed with the purchase unless they have it.

We've approached the freeholder (via their managing agent) on a few occasions to get one drawn up - or at least written confirmation they'll issue one to the new owner - but they've refused. Their main objection is that they're a portfolio owner, its admin, they don't want to change their existing leasehold engagement model etc.

Can the freeholder reasonably withhold providing consent to let or are they legally obliged to, assuming the lease doesn't say anything to the contrary?

Any other suggestions about how to resolve this appreciated

thanks

The answer is in the lease. If the wording says that the consent to let is in the gift of the freeholder, then they can decline. If the consent can't be unreasonably withheld (or something similar), that doesn't sound like a reasonable objection to me, but that's not going to help in practice.

If the lease doesn't say that the consent will always be given (which would be bizarre), I'd say your route to resolving this might involve either evicting the tenant, persuading the purchaser to go ahead anyway or to take the freeholder to a tribunal, none of which are quick or guaranteed to work.

It might be possible to persuade the freeholder to confirm that they don't ever do consent to let, but, also, that they have no current plans to stop or penalise people who do let.

Quote from: jpkeates on December 12, 2023, 10:19:10 AMThe answer is in the lease. If the wording says that the consent to let is in the gift of the freeholder, then they can decline. If the consent can't be unreasonably withheld (or something similar), that doesn't sound like a reasonable objection to me, but that's not going to help in practice.

If the lease doesn't say that the consent will always be given (which would be bizarre), I'd say your route to resolving this might involve either evicting the tenant, persuading the purchaser to go ahead anyway or to take the freeholder to a tribunal, none of which are quick or guaranteed to work.

It might be possible to persuade the freeholder to confirm that they don't ever do consent to let, but, also, that they have no current plans to stop or penalise people who do let.

Thank you - this has given me some useful perspective