makes no sense to me but not my area of expertise. What difference does freehold vs leasehold make to repossession?
Two main reasons, by far the biggest/most important is that simply as most mortgage lenders will not lend on Freehold flats, that instantly restricts the market if you ever have to repocess and then sell the property.
The other reason is a legal reason which admittedly I googled, but this sums it up quite well.
"The legal issue is this: because a freehold flat sits within a building you have to rely on your fellow flat-owners to maintain, for example, the roof, the main walls, even the foundations. There isn’t usually a clear legal obligation or agreement between everyone to force people to make repairs or keep things in good condition. There isn’t even a legal obligation to share the costs of the work that needs to be done. Even if there is, when one freeholder sells their flat there’s no legal guarantee that the new owner will agree to do the decent thing. A leasehold, on the other hand, runs with the land so deals with the issue of maintenance and repair via specific covenants.
All this means freehold flats tend to be less valuable and desirable than leasehold flats or flats with part-ownership of the entire building’s freehold. And that means it is also very hard to re-mortgage properties like this."
I did also think it could also have to do with access rights, I couldnt find anything on that, but there still may be some truth in that. You have to be careful on a leasehold flat if the freehold is also owned by the same party/linked to the same party, as the freeholder can legally refuse you access to the property through the communal areas/ground in front, as your legal charge is only held over the lease of the actual flat, and although I actually cannot think of the exact reason why not, there may be a similar issue, it could also be that whoever told me that was talking out of their backside......
