Freehold house, leasehold garage?

[WillIEverGetThere]

Offer accepted on a freehold house three days ago. There's a garage behind the house - just a row of three garages on a load of flat land. There is no flat, property etc above or attached to it, just literally a block of three garages. Mine is the middle one. I've asked the EA to check this out as I'm not touching a leasehold with a barge pole and will pull out if it is. She's said she'll check and get back to me but I'm still waiting.

Has anyone else had experience of this?

Bump

Is it a long lease rather than a short, is it a private freeholder or the local authority etc and are all the garages in the same position regarding leasehold? This would make a difference for me but I would be more relaxed about a leasehold garage than a house. There's always something that isn't quite right about house choosing and maybe a reason to go back a renegotiate a little? Having said that, it depends what you need the garage for and what the alternative would be if it's a short lease that ends when you're living there. That last bit could be a dealbreaker for me rather than the principle.

Do you need the garage? Could you sell it back to the person who owns the freehold? Or dies the council own the land?!

I would be much less worried about a garage than the entire house. They're less expensive, worth less, won't impact your mortgage. Obviously you'd still need to check the ground rent etc, but I don't think it's an insurmountable obstacle and I'm really not a fan of leasehold normally.

Ask them how long the lease is. 125 years is not ideal if the house is freehold. You want 999. Otherwise it's nowhere near as bad as a flat.

Leasehold to me is nearly as frightening as the word plague. Purely because I've done so much research on flats and houses (why anyone ever buys flats is beyond me).

I don't think the EA even knows anything about the garage and to be honest I'm not that interested in it anyway. It's a lovely little house and I really want it, plus it's in a nice street and there is plenty of places to park. I got it VERY cheap (£14k below the asking price) as it's been part exchanged for a NB by the previous owners and it's now in the hands of the building company and they just want it off their hands.

The garage looks shit. It's not freshly painted or anything and there are shrubs here there and everywhere so I hardly want to pay any maintenance for it. It just looks like a block of three unused old garages on a bit of wasteland. If anything I'd probably keep garden furniture in there during the winter.

I just don't want anyone holding me over a barrel that I have no control over. I'm finally buying a home of my own, want my renting days to be over!

There are four terraced houses. The one on the right end has a drive and after doing a little bit of research it looks like the three garages are for the other three remaining houses (both house and garage in the middle of the three would be mine). Don't know if that makes a difference.

Can part of one property be leasehold and the rest freehold?
(Google not helping)
Sounds like the house has always been freehold and a previous owner has subsequently bought the leasehold garage.
You may be buying 2 properties bundled together

Just read your recent post.
It sounds like the garages are leasehold because of the shared access

I think this is fairly common, though in the case of the property I looked at, the owners of the properties owned equal shares in the freehold of the land the garages sat on (it does make sense because the garage land wasn't adjacent to the property exactly and the shared drive was managed in this way rather than by right of access which is fraught with a different set of issues

So basically... I am not going to get a £3,000,000,000,000 service bill for some cunty unused garage and should not pull out over this? It was all going so well 😔

Would one of the neighbours want to take over 'your' garage? Ask them!
If someone else takes on the garage you might be able to drop the house price that little bit extra, too.

Can you negotiate buying the house without the garage?
Do you know who is freeholder of garages is?
Is there an option to buy a share of the freehold of garages?

We bought a freehold house with a lease garage. The garage is one of three under a coach. Half of the houses in our estate have garages on leasehold, the other half mostly have integrated garages.

We pay £25 a year for the lease. It cost a bit exact during conveyance (£100) to ensure that the lease is correct and reasonable, but otherwise no problem.

It depends on the terms of the lease if there's ground rent or if it's peppercorn, how long is the lease and is there a maintenance charge for the surrounding land. No one can advise without knowing all the details.

Purely because I've done so much research on flats and houses (why anyone ever buys flats is beyond me).
Wow. I presume you don't live in London or Manchester or Edinburgh then where there is little choice for millions if they can not have a monster commute.
You've had poor advice above - this is common on shared property as otherwise it's hard to debate who pays for a collapsed roof that affects one garage only. The key thing is:

• how long is the lease?
• what is the ground rent and maintenance?

If the lease is 80+ years and there are low costs, I'd be fine.

They've got back to me. Apparently the house and the garage are both freehold and there are "no maintenance costs" but I still want my Solicitor to tell me everything I need to know about the whole thing as I still don't really understand it. If the garage is freehold great but who owns the big wasteland it sits on, the council? The plot thickens... and sorry about the flats comment I'm not from any major city and didn't consider your very good point x

Not a lawyer but I would read the paperwork about the garage for myself to see if there is any correspondence re planning permision/repairs/access/disputes to get a feel for what is going on etc. in addition to what your solicitor says.