Thread by @LiamSpender

1/11 In "Dog Bites Man" news, a man who makes living managing leasehold property for an Italian count pens piece on #leaseholdreform saying:

England still needs freehold system propertyweek.com/insight/englan…

2/11 This article is written by the CEO of Wallace Partnership Group.

This a freeholder actively dumping its own interests in cladding-affected buildings in the hope it will not be responsible for remedial works under the Building Safety Act 2022.

3/11 Like its fellow Residential Freehold Association member E&M, Wallace fought tooth and nail to avoid being made responsible in any way for building or fire safety under the Building Safety Act 2022.

Now they claim we can't live without them.

4/11 The Wallace Partnership is ultimately owned by a Gibraltar based company (Perseverance Limited), and controlled by Italian Count Luca Rinaldo Contardo Padulli

The group (legally) paid no Corporation Tax in the UK in 2021, despite recording a profit of £21 million.

5/11 Every penny this so-called professional freeholder spends on building maintenance, fire safety and health and safety comes out of residents' pockets, never its own off-shore pockets.

The only money in the leasehold game comes from residents, not the freeholders.

6/11 And it is a lot of money.

In 2021 Wallace collected:

£11.4 million in ground rents

£3.9 million in voluntary lease extension premia, and

£1.6 million in insurance commission.

Money that could have been spent on buildings, but which instead went to Wallace.

7/11 The insurance arm of Wallace Partnership Group made a profit margin of 72% (you read that right, 72%) on its insurance commission income in 2021.

Why does Wallace Partnership Group (or any company) need a 72% profit margin?

What value does it add?

8/11 The article also runs a tired straw man argument.

No-one arguing for leasehold reform in England suggests the Scottish system.

Nor is the Scottish system a part of English law.

We already have Commonhold on the books, we just need it to be improved and spread widely.

9/11 Communal living will never be easy, but moving to such a system need not involve residents suing each other or buildings falling into disrepair, as this article claims.

A well-designed system would both avoid disputes and cut out the middlemen with their 72% profit margins.

10/11 It is no exaggeration to say that every other country *on Earth* manages to organise resident-owned blocks without a so-called professional freeholder.

So can we.

And it is high time we did so.

11/11 Wallace 2021 group accounts (source for the figures above) available here:

…te.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/118551…

Insurance co accounts here:

…te.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/015358…