Clauses in lease - is this normal and AIBU?

[MinesaBottle]

I posted a while ago about our neighbours/co-freeholders requiring us to sign a lease extension for them and also hand over our ownership of 50% of the loft – for free! To update, we got legal advice, got a survey done and the neighbours have agreed to pay us a reasonable sum, so that’s all good.

The buyer wants to do a loft conversion (it’s the upstairs flat) and I have no real objection except he wants it written into the lease that we allow access to scaffolders and builders (there is no access to our garden from the back, so tradesmen would have to come through our house which I am not happy about) and also wants it in the lease that we won’t object to the planning application! I am not happy with this either, as I am not going to promise not to object to something I haven’t even seen the plans for.

Obviously we’re consulting our solicitor but has anyone else had this? Is it normal? I really wouldn’t have thought it would be necessary to put this kind of thing in the lease itself. I guess he’s trying to get as much as he can and will be open to negotiation, but we are co-freeholders, not his tenants or employees!

Thank fuck for that.

Our lovely neighbour has just had an extension built. We gave permission for her builders to put scaffolding in our drive, not realising it would have to go over the roof of our garage as well.

When the scaffolders took it down, they dropped a scaffold pole through the garage roof, and on to DP's most precious motorbike, mercifully without doing more than rip the cover. The fuckers didn't tell anyone they'd done it, and denied it afterwards, but the builder has repaired all the damage.

It was only after the scaffolding came down and we could see the extension that we realised that the guttering overhangs our property, so we can't extend up to our boundary.

I'm never agreeing to anything like that again.

You made the right decision OP. And whilst your neighbours might be upset, perhaps they'll learn not to make promises they can't keep next time.

@MinesaBottle you have made the right decision

Obviously your neighbor will be upset, but maybe they can get their lease extension sorted now and concentrate on finding a buyer without lying about the loft conversion potential!

I really think you did the right thing op.

Thank goodness!

Lucky escape OP

You've got as a lucky escape. I can understand why they'd be pissed off but it's you who would have been left with the shit whilst they are living in their peaceful new house.

Make sure they stop marketing it with the loft otherwise youll have this all over again with the next buyer.

Oh we will. We've learned a lesson and I think they have as well.

Thank God you pulled out. You are obviously far too nice! Your neighbours' problems are nothing to do with you, however the ongoing enjoyment and future saleability of your home are in your control. Agreeing to even an amended proposal would have put that in jeopardy. If any future buyer comes along with any idea of using your home as a construction site and taking you for idiots, remember the age old MN saying,,,

NO is a complete sentence!

Lakie if you discover that their guttering is technically trespassing on your property isn't there something that you can do to complain or get recompense or get them to fix it? Have you got legal cover on your house insurance? Or could you ring up your local planning department? Have the neightbours had the grace to say anything?

Sounds like there should be something you could do - it's awful that you could be left disadvantaged like that! What would happen if you said that you wanted to build up to your boundary and they would have to fix their guttering so you could?