The term ‘village green’ may conjure up to most people an image of a picturesque piece of open grass. However, the Court of Appeal has ruled in an important test case that a beach can be regarded as a village…
A Land Registry error which resulted in two individuals being concurrently registered as freehold owners of the same plot of land has been put right by the Court of Appeal in a test case which raised an important point of…
When a building contract for a block of flats went wrong, leaving the new building with many defects, an architect who had no contract with the owners of the flats found himself in the firing line. When the block of…
Legislation increasing permitted development rights for business premises and the re-use of existing buildings has recently come into force. Key features include: Permitting the change of use of offices to residential. Allowing the flexible use of existing agricultural buildings. The…
Landlords who seek a payment of rent in advance as a means of reducing the chance of a tenant defaulting on its liabilities under a tenancy agreement will be reassured by a Court of Appeal decision. The court held that…
A trust exists where a person who has legal ownership of something (‘the object of the trust’) is obliged to act with respect to the object of the trust for the benefit of some other person or persons (‘the beneficiaries’)…
A 15-year-long boundary dispute between neighbours on an island in the middle of the River Thames, concerning a strip of land measuring just 10 feet in width, has been resolved by a judge who treated the position of an old…
Landlords will welcome a Supreme Court decision clarifying how the Leasehold Valuation Tribunal (LVT) should approach dispensation applications. The decision confirms that if the landlord can show that no relevant prejudice was caused, a breach of the requirements will not…
A homeowner who was fined £960 after he failed to comply with a local authority enforcement notice requiring him to demolish an unauthorised extension to his property has lost an appeal against his conviction and financial penalty. The Court of…
A man who sold a house after forging certificates for planning permission for works he had carried out but for which planning permission had not been obtained was recently sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment. The man had applied on three…
