It was a requirement under the 1967 Act for the notice of a lessee, seeking to extend his interest under that Act, to indicate whether he was seeking the freehold or an extended lease. The tenant failed to do so.
Held: This failure was fatal. Under the statutory scheme, the notice was designed to lead to a ‘statutory contract’ binding on both parties. If the notice had been held to be valid: ‘The remarkable result would be that there would instantly spring into being at the moment of its service two statutory contracts, both binding on the parties and each differing in important respects from the other.’ The notices were inconsistent: as soon as the written notice is given, there is a binding contract, I cannot see any room for a notice in the alternative. If a tenant gives a notice that he desires `the freehold or an extended lease’, without saying which, there can be no binding contract. The statute simply cannot begin to operate. If I may put it into the form of offer and acceptance, it stands in this way: the landlord, under the compulsion of the statute, whether he likes it or not, makes an offer to the tenant to let him either buy the freehold at a fair price or to take an extended lease of 50 years at a fair rent. In order to accept that offer, so as make a binding contract, the tenant must accept one of these alternatives. If he replies: `I desire to have either the freehold or an extended lease,’ then there is no contract because no one knows which it is. It is too uncertain to be a contract. ‘ (Lord Denning)
Judges:
Lord Denning MR, Edmund Davies LJ
Citations:
[1969] 2 QB 253
Statutes:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Scammell and Nephew Ltd v HJ and JG Ouston HL 1941
There was an agreement for a purchase on ‘hire-purchase terms’ It was challenged as being too uncertain.
Held: There were many possible forms of such an agreement. The agreement was void for uncertainty. Lord Wright: ‘There are in my opinion . .
Cited by:
Cited – M25 Group Limited v Tudor and others CA 4-Dec-2003
Tenants served notices under the Act requiring information about the disposal of the freehold. The landlords objected that the notices were invalid in failing to give the tenants’ addresses as required under the Act.
Held: The addresses were . .
Cited – Barclays Bank plc v Bee and Another CA 10-Jul-2001
The landlord’s solicitors, by mistake, sent two notices to the tenant in the same letter. One notice opposed the grant of a new tenancy but on an invalid ground, and the other said a new tenancy would not be opposed. The tenant sought clarification. . .
Cited – Kent and Another v Kavanagh and Another CA 2-Mar-2006
The parties owned properties part of a building estate. The properties had been held under leases, but those had been enfranchised. The question was as to how the easements granted by the leases were preserved on enfranchisement. A particular . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Landlord and Tenant
Updated: 13 May 2022; Ref: scu.194053