OFT to investigate activities of leasehold property managers

They may or may not be taking kick backs. The fact is that the sector is so corrupt and lacks transparency that the truth is lost.

Annette may be going through the process that she states. I know that managing agents don't even bother to carry out a basic due diligence or even establish correct correspondence addresses of the leaseholders.

The above gives the Managing Agents excuse to earn some extra fees by charging admin fee & when the leaseholder does not pay the admin fee the files get passed onto their lawyers(some cases the lawyers are family members) and another little earner of kick backs/commission for introducing the business and in the mean time the cash flow is starved of funds reflecting in a deterioration in the block.

In one instance I had not been sent ground rent demand to the correct address for five years. In order that my lenders do not have to pay the funds out. I paid out. It took me two and a half year to recover my money and this was a week before the hearing date. You guessed it no cost for my time effort & energy.

People buy a house for peaceful & quite occupation & they either pay up for the extortion or draw swords with the Freeholder/managing Agents

I had been taken to Courts by the agents on four occasions and they lost every time. I represented myself & was not entitled to my cost besides tube fare. The managing despite of the Court order would not pay me the tube fare until I threaten them to take them Court once again & believe me. I would have taken them to the courts for the £5 or so

Reply to the comment left by "Annette Stone" at "08/12/2013 - 19:09":

"Having read what you and Yvette have said I do not understand why you have not gone to a company like mine to see if we can help with transferring the management of the badly managed block as we are surely not the only company prepared to help and provide good and fair management."

I can quite see how you would feel like that. If all leaseholders would take time to listen, to care that their service charges increase year on year, to understand that the service should be better etc etc then the Resident's Associations I have established would make some headway in persuading the freeholder that the management agency should change. Too many leaseholders either don't care about the service they receive, or, as is often the case in the blocks I am referring to, they do not have the time to get to grips with the Budget and final accounts etc that show where money is being spent. The idea of the RA's was so that the Association could be voted in to then make those decisions on behalf of the laissez faire leaseholders. However for a change in the managing agents our freeholders want to see a majority vote...it's difficult enough to get even those leaseholders that have joined the Association to respond yet alone to actively vote.
In addition we are aware that, there are quite a few bad managing agents along with a number of good ones too! We therefore need to make the right choice. For example, Annette, I have enjoyed your posts and am always interested in a recommendation from Mark Alexander, but when I searched on your property mgmt company a few days ago I read a number of bad reports that were completely contrary to the impression I am getting from your posts. Perhaps they are very old reports I didn't check that, but it is discouraging when trying to choose a new agent, that we don't want to jump out of the frying pan and into the fire.

Yes, we know RTM is an option too, but again problem with numbers and getting everyone to vote.

I will not be discouraged though, there is only way and that is ahead, I will not be dissuaded from trying to change what seems to be fundamentally wrong in this process--->-------->

Yvette. I am not sure what point you are making. I think we do a good job but we are not perfect. I have readily told you that not everyone likes us.

I never read about my firm or myself as no disgruntled lessee ever provides both sides of the story. That is only human nature and there are far better indicators of the service we provide such as the sort of references we can provide to lessees whose buildings we are interested in managing and/or the number of LVT decisions that have gone against us.

Taking on new management is also a two way street and when we are asked to manage we always try to check to see the profile of a building and the problems that have occurred to get a feel of the lessees and what may be in store for the firm

In past years when we have taken on portfolios for clients we have ended up with problems that were inherited that led to problems for us either with the type of building or with some of the lessees. As we have grown and gained experience we have learnt how to avoid trouble and we do not take on every building that is offered to us.

Since you are clearly an experienced lessee you will surely know that a good, experienced and helpful managing agent could help you to change managing agents and you also probably know that if you try and restrict your choice to a firm who have experience but who have never upset anyone and never had anyone who is disgruntled refer to them negatively on the internet you will have few to choose from.

That's without talking about the darlings who threaten to write about you if you don't do whatever it is they want........trust me I have amazing stories.

Happy to help anyone who needs good management if it fits with our portfolio but it is impossible to help where there is a huge antipathy to any managing agent as that is too big a mountain to climb!

Many of the leaseholders in my block are non resident Landlord or just do not understand the process of joining the resident association. As a result we just cannot get the numbers up.

One option was to make the non resident/others to join was to charge voluntary the membership fee of £5.00 per annum via the service charges.

Guess what the F/H/Landlord will not allow the membership fee to be collected in the above manner. The F/H & the management company are part of the same group of companies. Divide and extort comes to mind & being Christmas turkeys voting for Christmas is another one.

Can I just make a further point about what you read on the net. I just went on to Amazon to see how to buy Mary's book. Mark recommends it as do others but guess what, some people hate it. Were their comments constructive - were they heck! Will it stop me utilising the expertise of someone whose work I have found interesting and informative - absolutely not. Sorry to use this as an example Mary but I find the net can be very destructive sometimes and often it is the home of those with an axe to grind. What do I know though - I'm an old lady!!!

Like everything in life it cuts both way.

Reply to the comment left by "shakeel ahmad" at "08/12/2013 - 21:14":

I experienced this too...once I persuaded the managing agent to send out a flyer for the RA in the next round of service charges and we had a flurry of new joiners. But the freeholder got wind of it and would not let them do it again. In fact they sent me a letter stating that it was not common practice for the freeholder OR the managing agent to assist in this. Yet we feel we help the managing agent and therefore freeholder in many ways, certainly with dissemination of information via our website!

I see people complaining of months to get repairs done, oh how I wish it were that easy, you must be dealing with amateurs.

Try asking for decorations for a year plus, getting agreement to sort it out amongst the leaseholders, then just before it goes ahead a section 20 from the agent to block us. Then over 2 years to get from intention to estimates...

And all this talk of contracts and consultation - lucky you, that is all optional!

This is very good news, but I can't help but feel that we will end up with a wishy washy report which benefits nobody but the 'rogue' Freeholders.

I (and fellow leaseholders) am currently in dispute with 2 such Freeholders and their stooge agents, who are nothing more than common criminals. They are committing fraud, and use the threat of legal action to 'divide and conquer'. In any other sphere, they would not be allowed to get away with it.

For what it's worth, I will provide my input to the OFT, because to do nothing is inexcusable ...rather like that twat, Russell Brand, who says we shouldn't vote, but doesn't say how he would change things.

I've just noticed that the OFT launched a similar market study into property managers in Scotland in June 2008, and recommended a self-regulatory scheme. The very same issues which prompted that market study will be raised with this latest study for England & Wales. Rogue property managers' and freeholders' ethics don't change because of some artificial line between Carlisle and Gretna!

Can anyone say if that market study has had any beneficial effect in Scotland?