CREM's letter to lessees

Lessees have again received letters from CREM stating that the lease restricts them from allowing anyone to 'share' (use) their parking space, and that by doing so they are in breach of the lease.  This is incorrect: by authorising visitors and other persons to use your flat/parking space on an informal/temporary basis, where no possessional rights and/or monies are transferred, the advice that RACR has received is that you are not in breach of your lease.  A copy of RACR's letter to CREM concerning this matter can be found here. 

The appointment of a Tribunal-appointed manager meant that CREM lost their responsibility to manage the estate and the residential leases: responsibility for delivering/enforcing the rights and obligations contained in our leases is now with the Tribunal's manager, Mr Coates.  The Management Order - the legal document underpinning Mr Coates' appointment - states that "The Manager shall manage the Premises in accordance with... the respective obligation of all parties - landlord and tenant - under the Lease' (para.2a) and that "no other party shall be entitled to exercise a management function in respect of the Premises".    CREM should not be writing to and harassing lessees. 

Please also see our earlier news item on this matter.  

The lease clauses that CREM's letter refers to (11.2-11.6) apply equally to the parking space and to your flat.   Were CREM's restrictive interpretation of the clause, and specifically the word 'share', to be correct, only persons named on the lease/tenancy agreement would be allowed to use the flat/car park space.  This would mean that anyone not named in the lease (spouses, children, family and friends etc) would not be able to stay in the flat and/or park in the parking space!  We would like to think that no conveyancing solicitor would have allowed that to get past them, given it would inevitably mean the vast majority of lessees would be at risk of breaching their lease, and deny them the quiet enjoyment of their demised flat and car park space together with their families and friends.  

In reply to a lessee's enquiry as whether their visitor could park in their space,  CREM's answer was: "The terms of the lease are clear and it is of course not for us to advise you".  But isn't that exactly what their letters are:  'advice' on what the lease apparently does or does not permit?   Why didn't they answer the lessee's simple question?  Because the answer would of course have had to be 'yes'!

CREM allege that Mr Coates' interpretation of the lease (lessees can allow their visitors and estate staff to use their parking spaces - provided the arrangement is informal, does not involve payment etc) amounts to 'inducing' lessees to breach their leases.  This is simply nonsense.