Justin Selig - solicitor

Sat - my email address is justin@seligpartners.co.uk... Read More

Dear Sat
We are a firm of solicitors based in West London and have considerable experience in dealing with Section 5 notices both acting for leaseholders and freeholders.
Let me know if we can be of any help,
Thanks
Justin Selig... Read More

Hi Ian
There shouldn't be any SDLT implications, though there would be Land Registry Fees, which would be minimal.... Read More

Dear Henry

As per Howard's response, you simply need to create a leasehold title for the maisonette and borrow against that - not the freehold. It is quite simple to do, you need to grant a long lease out of your freehold title - although you can't grant a lease to yourself, so you would need to grant the lease to a different person than the freeholder. So if you owned the freehold in your own name, you could grant the maisonette lease to yourself and your partner, or vice versa. Alternatively you could transfer the freehold into a limited company and grant the lease of the maisonette to yourself in your personal capacity.
Once you have done that, you should be able to borrow from most lenders.

Justin... Read More

Catherine

Normally the solicitor acting for the freeholder will obtain an undertaking to pay their costs from the leaseholder's solicitors. There should be no costs exposure for yourself. You should also get the leaseholders to pay your surveyor's costs so as to ensure that the proposed premium they have offered to pay is the best figure you can obtain.

We act for both freeholders and leaseholders on lease extensions and collective enfranchisements.

If you would like any further information, please email me at justin@lawdepartment.co.uk... Read More

In response to the postings this week, firstly David Louden - please would you email me with your details - to justin@lawdepartment.co.uk

The reason we need more sign ups is that the legal funders need a sizeable pot of money to be recovered from BOI in order to make it worth their while to fund the case. They expect to make a profit out of this and their profit will come from the money recovered from the BOI. If we only have approx 120 claimants, then the pot of money will not be large enough for the funders. That is why we need at least 250 claimants.

In terms of my firm funding this, initially, whilst I am prepared to defer some of my charges - in fact we have been acting on this case for free since last August - I am not prepared to lay out money - which we will need to do - to pay for barristers etc.

Since my last posting, we have had about 6 more sign ups - they are trickling in, but we need more than that. I am therefore speaking to someone who has experience with trying to recruit claimants and will report back shortly.... Read More

I would very much like to progress this, but we do need critical mass to move forward. Not much has changed since my last post. I have about 120 confirmed instructions, but I really need double that to make this a possibility.

I expect that a number of people (particularly residential borrowers) are waiting to see what the outcome of the FOS investigations are - as that is still ongoing.

If we had commitment from more people then we could start to move this forward again.... Read More

LEGAL ACTION UPDATE:

Following on from our update a few weeks ago, we are waiting to hear back from the QC as to the cost of putting his opinion into writing. We already have a written opinion from his junior, and the QC gave us a verbal opinion over the phone, but in order to obtain litigation funding, we need him to confirm his advice in writing. Once we hear back, I will update the forum.

I expect that there will be a cost involved in doing this and then in order to get a firm offer of funding we are going to have to prepare a very detailed submission to the funders. We have estimated that this will take approximately 20-30 hours of work - which is not something we will do for free. Therefore, in order to get the ball rolling we do need people to start contributing. However - rather than incurring the cost of collecting the money and then having to return it (if we don't get enough people), we would like people to indicate whether or not they are prepared to proceed on this basis.

At this stage, we have receive 118 confirmed indications. Before it becomes worthwhile, we need to get to at least 250 - so if anyone who was thinking about joining hasn't come back to us, please will you let me know.

Thanks
Justin... Read More

Mark

That is a good point and one I will give some thought to over the weekend. The reason we were looking for funds in advance was to carry out some preliminary work including obtaining the written QC's opinion (we only have a verbal QC opinion and the written opinion from James Barnard) and following up with the FCA as we felt they had not dealt with this in a proper manner.... Read More

LEGAL ACTION UPDATE:

Further to my recent update we are currently assessing the demand to move this case forward.

To date we have received 118 positive confirmations. We won't be in a position to proceed until we reach our minimum target of 400 mortgages.

We are meeting a firm of solicitors on Monday who specialises in class actions against banks with a view to teaming up with them to move this forward. I will update the forum again after that meeting.

If you are interested in pursuing the case against BOI and have not yet let me know, please will you do so by emailing boi@lawdepartment.co.uk... Read More

Ian

Yes, the intention is to cap it once we have a firmer view on the actual figures.... Read More

To respond to a few questions posed since my posting on Friday:-

Firstly, those who have recently contributed £500 will receive a refund of £320, so that their contribution to this stage of the action will be the same as everyone else's - £150+VAT (£180).

Secondly, in terms of numbers, as Mark has stated - it is difficult to be exact, but I have put the target down as 400 mortgages. This is based on the following assumptions:-

Average size of mortgage: £50,000
Amount extra paid for each mortgage: £2,000 for a year
Total fund (based on one complete year of overpayments and a complete win on all elements of the claim): 400 x £2,000 = £800,000.

Based on our estimates of the costs of both sides, this should be sufficient.... Read More

LEGAL ACTION UPDATE:

We met litigation funders earlier this week to discuss the possibility of funding a claim against BOI. The brief to the funders was that we would like them to fund the costs of bringing the claim and also cover any adverse costs should our claim not be successful.

When we started looking into the BOI claim over a year ago, this was not an option as litigation funding only works where there is a potential pot of money to pay the funder where the claim is successful.

Now that a year has passed, there is a potential pot of money as all affected borrowers have been paying increased payments to BOI as a result of the increase in interest rates charged.

Our claim against BOI would be for a refund of those increased payments and a requirement that they revert to charging the correct interest rate as set out in the original mortgage offers.

We are pleased to report that we received an indication from the funder that they would be able to support such a claim provided we obtained enough claimants. One condition would be that any money recovered from BOI as a result of the excess payments made could be used to pay the funders in the event of a successful claim. The borrowers would still benefit as the interest rate would revert to the original rates.

We will shortly post further details on this forum as to what you need to do next, but we need an indication from people as to whether or not they would be interested in joining such an action. We will require a small admin fee of £150+VAT per mortgage to cover our initial costs and we will be writing again to explain how this can be paid.

If you are interested in pursuing such a claim against BOI, on the basis that it would only cost you £150+VAT per mortgage plus agreeing to apply any of your extra payments to BOI which we have recovered to paying the funders, please would you email me at boi@lawdepartment.co.uk.... Read More

LEGAL ACTION UPDATE:

We are meeting with the insurers next Tuesday to discuss the required cover to enable us to start proceedings against the Bank of Ireland. The plan is to obtain both litigation funding and after the event insurance so the majority of costs are covered both in bringing the action and also to cover any adverse costs awarded against us if we lose.

There is by now a significant "pot" of money being the increased payments everyone has made from last May to date, which should be recoverable from BOI.

We will update the forum after the meeting.

In the meantime, in response to some earlier discussions about Small Claims Court, there is nothing to stop anyone bringing a claim against BOI in the small claims court. The advantage is that there is no costs consequence should you lose - the main requirement is that the amount in dispute needs to be less than £10,000. You could claim for repayment of the increased payments you have made over the past year, provided that they are less than £10,000. However, if lots of people bring Small Claims of a similar nature, then the court may consolidate the claims together and they will no longer be classified as a Small Claims, and there would be costs consequences.... Read More

Yes- as per Mark's comment - I have copies of all the marketing literature - so no need to look for it. This was sent to the FOS with our original complaint last May. Still waiting to receive a response.... Read More

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Dear All,

Yesterday we received letters from the Financial Ombudsman Service to all BOI complainants. The letters enclosed a factsheet relating to BOI interest rate complaints.

The factsheet states that FOS have made some preliminary decisions as to the fairness of BOI’s decision. They also say that they have asked BOI and some of the complainants for further information. Once they receive this, they will be in touch again.

We spoke to FOS and understand that some of the letters requesting further information did not reach us. They have sent the questionnaire to us again and will allow those people questioned sufficient time to respond. We will circulate the fact sheet and questionnaire by email.

The FOS have explained that each case will be considered individually.

We believe this is a positive move, in that they haven’t rejected everyone’s claims. The issue is that there are a number of different groups of borrowers and the decisions may be different in each case – so they may reject some complaints and uphold others.

In the meantime, we are meeting with an insurer on 20th May to discuss litigation and after the event insurance, in the event that the FOS investigations come to nothing.

We are hopeful that this is a positive step.

If you would like to join the action, please will you contact us at boi@lawdepartment.co.uk. We need to build a sufficient fighting fund in order for us to bring an action against BOI. If we don't raise enough money to proceed, we will refund the money less our admin costs.... Read More

LEGAL ACTION UPDATE:

This week we have started work on the next stage of the action. We have been liaising with our barrister who will be preparing the claim.

We have also prepared costs budgets which will be needed once the claim has started and also for the benefit of the insurers.

In order not to delay matters further, we would like everyone who is interested in proceeding with the action to contact us immediately. We will be asking for a commitment fee of £500 which will be utilised towards paying our fees and the barrister's fees to bring the action. We are hoping that you will be able to recoup this fee once we get insurance in place, but we do not want to delay matters further by waiting for this to be in place.

If you would like to proceed, please contact me at:
BOIClaim@lawdepartment.co.uk... Read More

... Read More

LEGAL ACTION UPDATE:-

As you know, we have been liaising with insurers who specialise in funding litigation and insuring third party costs risks. We have had some productive discussions and in particular they believe that a new insurer on the market may be able to offer us a package which would include funding and third party insurance rolled into one. This option would mean that the Law Department would also have to take on some of the litigation risk by entering into a conditional fee agreement. We are still exploring how this would work in practice as this is a relatively new product, and we need to be sure that the finer details will work. We hope to have some more concrete information in the next couple of weeks.

To explain why this is taking some time, we should perhaps explain a little bit about how litigation funding products work:

After the event insurance for third party costs (ATE insurance) and litigation funding work by covering costs if you lose the case. They also cover their own premiums if you lose, so there is nothing to pay.

However, if you win your case, the ATE premium and funder’s fees are taken out of the damages pot.

The difficulty with this case is the main thing we are seeking in this litigation is a declaration that the increase was unlawful and its reversal going forward. There will also be some monetary damages, which will be the overpayments made from the inception of the increase until the date of the judgement. It is this element of the award that the funders/insurers will be interested in and which you are likely to have to forfeit in order to obtain funding. However, as there are quite a few different factual scenarios with BOI borrowers affected, as we have outlined before, it will be very difficult to bring one big claim for everyone. For this reason, our barristers have recommended that we bring two or three test cases instead. The problem with this is that if we bring a test case and win, the damages won won’t be high enough to pay off the insurance and funding premiums which will become payable at that point.

So, we are, with our barristers, thinking through a number of options and hope to be able to present something to you very soon.

Some of the options would involve everyone paying a sum of money up front. This could be to cover litigation costs. It might also be to cover an up-front ATE insurance premium, which is a cheaper form of insurance premium but needs to be paid at the start.

This is a very unsual factual scenario and we are exploring the available options. Please do bear with us - but we are trying to engineer a solution with the lowest possible upfront cost for everyone.... Read More