Absent freeholder

[MonkeyMadness7]

My partner and I recently had our offer accepted on a 3 bed leasehold flat. We are 6 weeks in and have just been told that there is an absent freeholder. The vendors have lived in the property for 11 years and were paying service charges and ground rent up until 7 years ago. My solicitor is concerned that the flat might not be mortgageable and will need to send out enquiries as the vendor hasn't provided much information. Whilst we wait for them to come back to us, my solicitor is going to ring the lender and ask them what it is that they will actually need if the mortgage was granted.

I know all lenders are different, but if you've been through something like this before I'd really appreciate your advice. If you had a mortgage what sort of things did they request?

Many thanks!

There was a massive thread on this about 3 days ago - have a look at the recent property thread titles

There’s a long thread about this from this week on this board, but the buyer pulled out. It’s an absolute nightmare, and your mortgage company are unlikely to be at all happy going ahead until the freeholder is found and any outstanding moneys paid.

Whether that’s possible, totally depends on who owns the freehold. Someone does, even if the original company has gone bust - it’ll be the Crown if nobody else has legal grounds.

But to be honest; I’d walk away if the vendors haven’t paid for 7 years and haven’t tried to resolve this.