A BRIEF HISTORY OF ADMIRAL'S COURT
Part 5Our Long March to Freedom!
It started one day in March when 1000s of miles from home in the Himalayan Foothills of Northern India where thoughts of Freehold were far from my mind. After logging on to the Interweb to check all was well at home it was no surprise to see a mail from Freehold Managers advising that despite the agreement of last year, they would be late in sending their annual Ground rent demands.
But that same e-mail also contained an intimation that at long last our thorn under their saddle had made its presence felt and “If you or a collective of leaseholders are interested in acquiring the freehold, please contact us so that we may negotiate a price.” OK so this involved them suggesting one price and us another and eventually splitting the difference. Negotiating at its finest! Resulting in an agreed offer on 28th April.
Now begins the process of discussing the project with our neighbours by way of Questionnaire and assessing the level of support. With a positive response of over 75% things looked very encouraging. A further circular on costs came back just as positive and by 14th May the collective decision was made to appoint Advocates, form a company, open a Bank account and collect the purchase monies from ‘a collective of interested parties.’ Surely that can’t take long? Can it?
It was never envisaged that 100% of Lessees could or would take advantage of the opportunity to be rid of Freehold Managers and the payment of ground rents. We needed finance to bridge the difference between the share each participant would pay and the amount of the purchase price. And so we ran headlong into our first obstacle. A simple request for Bank assistance to fund this shortfall of about £40,000, secured by land costing £160,000 i.e. FOUR times the value of the proposed debt was flatly turned down with the strange reason that “We don’t do loans of less than £500,000!” Eh??? No wonder all our small businesses and High Street shops are closing down. It seems that one can get 98% Mortgages for a house, just not 25% for the land the houses are built on.
So! Back to the members cap in hand to ask if they could would pay a higher price per share which happily, to their lasting credit they agreed although our 75% total take up dropped a few points.
One nice benefit emerged from this ‘difficulty’ following the first of two meetings of ‘interested parties’ at Ramsey Rugby Club in early July. We had all been focussed on the main objective of buying our Freedom from future Ground Rents for the much longer term of 999 years (which was in effect as close to Freehold as we were likely to get). The possible ‘investment potential’ of sharing in the Ground Rents that would still be received from those owners who were not taking part had been a secondary issue. After this was discussed one or two members asked for firmer details and, following consideration, offered extra cash for investment over and above the basic amount required. With this development the viability of the project was no longer in doubt.
 |
Meanwhile behind these financial problems, things had been moving along with creating the necessary infrastructure to facilitate the projects smooth operation. |
 |
We needed a Limited Company to handle the land purchase and finances democratically by shareholdings! Therefore, after the preparation of the multitude of Documents required to satisfy the stringent requirements of Isle of Man Company Law, Admirals Court Freehold Limited was incorporated under the Companies Acts of 1831-2004 on 27th June 2025.
Now that ‘we’ were a legal entity we could hold assets and cash so the next logical step was to open a Bank account. Shock number Two. This was no longer a simple visit to your friendly local High Street Branch to fill in a couple of forms and pick up a cheque book. Oh no! There were even more multiple forms in which we had to explain what the account was for, (what did they think a Bank Account was for? Don’t they know how their own product works?) Where the initial funds had come from? (“Er – Our Shareholders of course! That’s why they are called Shareholders, innit?”) All this plus personal ID such as Passports, Beneficial Ownership Registration and Anti Money Laundering declarations! As if we would actually declare any evil intentions if we had them! (“It’s like this Guv! We need somewhere to keep the cash we got from Ray Ling the Chinese Fence for our last Jewel job!”)
Then, to cap it all, just as we jumped the last hurdle they went and closed the Ramsey branch and we were made to sign up for electronic banking. We got our cheque book fully six weeks after applying and we could start collecting money from members towards the purchase price. Disclaimer! Despite making fun of all this, we did in fact get enormous and patient assistance from our bank throughout although I will spare his blushes by not naming names. They even let us use their counter to pay cheques in and have so far paid both the cheques we have written to date.
As these were both to our Advocate for the Deposit and then later the Balance of the purchase price of the Land this was just as well or this narrative would have come to a grinding halt.
With the Bank account now up and running we could bank those cheques that we had already received from keen participants and our first credits amounting to over £62,000 were paid in. It was now time for the acid test and ask all others to pay over their promised funds by the 14th August. Sadly, this was to engender further disappointments when one or more folks went back on their promises and withdrew. The whole project was back at risk and not for the first time the distinct possibility of failure loomed. The next Newsletter to our remaining participants was one of the hardest I have ever had to send.
The irony of the defaulters was not lost on me. Those that have failed to honour their promise have increased the Gross Rental income whilst the diminishing participating members (us) meant if we went ahead we would all get a larger share of that larger pot.
Happily, one or two new members appeared and the next Circular at the end of August was a much happier one. There was now enough in the Bank to close the deal.
September was an “off and on again” month as our project partners, Cleggan Freehold Limited, encountered the same kind of ‘broken promises’ that we had and Completion was continually delayed whilst they caught up. All was sorted and Completion was booked for 4th October when, would you believe it, Freehold Managers, apparently in Hock to their Bank, had to apply brakes whilst their bank went through more Anti laundry procedures on US!! How dare they?? That was the Bank that until recently was owned by the UK taxpayer so it should be US vetting THEM! Anyway, we got ticked as OK and the papers were signed and on Friday 24th October at 17.01, we Completed what we had started to do SEVEN months and 11 days earlier. Or THIRTY years depending on your point of view!
And as the final example of the ineptitude of our now Ex Landlords we received the usual list of Lessees with a breakdown of amounts paid and arrears and guess what? They had outstanding uncollected rents going back six years amounting to £5,820. Not our problem but a great example of how NOT to run a Ground Rent business. No wonder they are in hock to their Bank. Good luck to them.
Here’s to a brighter future for Admirals Court Freehold Limited.
There will be some minor changes but they will be for the better.
 |
| Our company Seal |