23rd
Feb 2022
Well at long last the government has decided that landlords whose properties in flats hit by the cladding scandal will be allowed to claim from the remediation fund.
However portfolio landlords with properties in the flats which are having the cladding remediation will not be allowed to claim from the £4bn funding, but those termed by the government as ‘accidental’ landlords will be able to.
Over the past few months there has been much media coverage on whether the government will actually help landlords in the affected tower blocks however in the latest amendment to the Building Safety Bill, the government intends to protect leaseholders who live in properties affected as their main residence and ‘accidental’ landlords’.
‘Accidental’ landlords covers those who either do not live in the flat but do not have another property to live in or those who own no more than one other property.
The majority of landlords in the affected buildings will be portfolio landlords in most city centre blocks and will cause even further delays to remedy the fire safety defects. Some leaseholders may be forced to become very dependant on the freeholders’ capability to fund the oncoming enormous bills.
The real ‘Big But’ is if the original developer or a freeholder can claim they do not have sufficient funds to pay for the costs, then the flat owners will have to ‘stump’ up the costs themselves whether they are landlords or not.
There is a cap to the costs for flat owners who have to pay themselves of £10,000 outside London and £15,000 in the city.
Richard Merrick of PIMS, says: “ In some cases - Show me a developer who does not have sufficient funds to cover the costs of their own making and I’ll show you a developer with an exceptional accountant and team.”
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