The right to manage and collective freehold acquisition
As members of the Association of Leasehold Enfranchisement Practitioners (ALEP), Ashley Wilson Solicitors are experts in collective enfranchisement – compelling your freeholder to sell the freehold of your property to you, the Leaseholder.
Understanding the technicalities of the legislation will provide you with the best advice to achieve your objectives. We work closely with your instructed valuation company to ensure that you achieve the very best result from a financial perspective and support you through the process to ensure a smooth transition.
Our expert team of solicitors can provide you with advice around whether the extent of the property you are entitled to acquire and all the information you need to help you start a claim to buy your freehold and undertake all legal and compliance actions on your behalf.
The “right to manage” is a useful tool in the event that you, like many others, are experiencing poor management of their building or paying high services charges and management fees and receiving little or no benefit.
By exercising your right to take over the management of your building you will take control and ensure that your services charges are reasonable and you benefit from the money which you are spending.
To acquire the right to manage you do not have to prove poor management by the Landlord. There are very little grounds for your Landlord to resist the claim. The process is relatively simple & quick. The Landlord’s consent is not required. No court order is necessary. A capital payment is not payable to the Landlord.
For comprehensive guidance on the right to manage please see our Right to Manage Guide within the document downloads section of this page.
The main disadvantage of exercising the right to manage as an alternative to freehold or collective enfranchisement (where you acquire the freehold) is that each flat owner's lease continues to become shorter and will need to be extended at some point (at capital cost to that flat owner). Also ground rent continues to be payable.
The Government has recently reconfirmed its proposal to implement reforms around Lease extension and freehold enfranchisement in the current term of Parliament.
Does a development constitute a single “building” or a number of separate “buildings” for the purpose of freehold enfranchisement?
There have been a number of decisions around the question of whether flat owners’ rights operate on a block by block basis or in respect of a number of blocks via single claim in connection with collective enfranchisement, the enfranchisement of the freehold to a single house, the right to manage and the right of first refusal.
The Government has now brought into force a number of provisions under the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024, implementing parts of the Law Commission’s recommendations relating to the Right to Manage (RTM). These were commenced by the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 (Commencement No. 3) Regulations 2025, which came into force on 3 March 2025.
While these reforms improve the existing RTM process in important ways, many of the more far-reaching recommendations remain outstanding and may be included in a future Leasehold and Commonhold Reform Bill. This raises the practical question for flat owners: should they proceed with an RTM claim now, or wait to see if further changes are made?
