The Practical Lawyer

This case related to a claim for an SDLT refund of £48,500. The property was described in the agent’s particulars as a ‘fantastic family home set in about 4.5 acres within the sought after New Forest National Park’ with six bedrooms, gardens, swimming pool, garaging, stable yard and paddocks. The appellants completed the purchase on 21 March 2016. The consideration was £1,775,000, on which the appellants paid SDLT of £126,750, having entered the property as residential on their SDLT1 return.

The tragedy at Grenfell Tower has brought the dangers of building cladding into sharp focus for those advising Bs and Ts. Some estimates indicate that there are still around 600 private buildings which have the same cladding as that used on the Grenfell Tower, namely aluminium composite material (ACM). The government has declared ACM and other cladding to be unsafe and building control deem all buildings with unsafe materials to be in breach of health and safety regulations. Many long leaseholders are faced with large service charge bills relating to costs incurred by the freeholder to replace unsafe cladding.

In the face of conveyancers being expected to advise on everything from electrical appliances to knotweed these days, practitioners may consider adding a line or two to their standard purchase report to remind Ss and Bs of the changes to fuel that can be put into wood burning stoves.

The Law Society has updated the Property Information Form (4th ed) (2020) (PIF) to be used as part of the Protocol from 7 February 2020. Most firms will access the form via their software or forms supplier and therefore might not consider the changes in too much detail. However, practitioners should consider the form and the Law Society’s detailed guidance notes as the changes may impact on advice given to S when completing the form and to advice to Bs when reporting on the contract and enquiries.

We reported in our May 2019 edition (p5) on an important change being introduced by HMLR to the wording of restrictions which comes into effect on 1 April 2020. From this date, HMLR will enforce a change to restriction consent wording. HMLR’s guidance states that:

Form UT1 is used for applications to upgrade the HMLR class of title.