Practice Area: Personal Litigation & Dispute Resolution

Even acts of generosity can lead to litigation if the basis for them is not professionally documented. That was sadly so in the case of a businessman who stepped forward to rescue close family friends from the threat of homelessness.

A couple with five children found themselves in dire financial circumstances. After the man was made bankrupt, an enforced sale of the family home was threatened. Their repeated attempts to obtain loan finance were rejected. The businessman came to their rescue by himself raising a £205,000 mortgage against the property.

Pursuant to an informal agreement between them, the property was transferred into the businessman’s name and the mortgage advance was paid to the couple, who used it satisfy their creditors and stave off possession proceedings. The couple thereafter met the mortgage repayments and continued to live in the property.

About eight years later, they sought to buy back their home from the businessman for the unchanged sum of £205,000. In resisting their request, however, he asserted that it had been agreed at the time that their entitlement to repurchase the property from him at that price would lapse two or three years after the transaction.

Ruling on the matter, the High Court noted that all involved had acted in great haste to face down the imminent financial peril that the couple faced. The businessman generously found a solution that could be implemented speedily and that secured the couple’s ability to carry on living in their family home.

In nevertheless upholding the couple’s case, the Court found on the evidence that the buyback agreement was open-ended and not time limited. Whilst that would be a very surprising outcome in a commercial context, it reflected the imminence of the possession proceedings and the close and affectionate relationship that the couple and the businessman had enjoyed at the relevant time.

It would, the Court found, be unconscionable for the businessman to go back on his assurance that the couple could, at any time, buy back their home from him for £205,000. They had relied on that assurance to their detriment. The ruling opened the way for the couple to repurchase their home from him at that price, plus any costs associated with discharging the mortgage and transferring title to the property.

Tenants have a right peacefully to enjoy their homes, free from harassment by their landlords. A judge succinctly made that point in awarding substantial compensation to a couple whose landlord was anxious to see the back of them so he could refurbish and sell their home with vacant possession.

The couple were tenants of a studio flat within a house in multiple occupation. Their landlord wished to convert the property back into a single dwelling and market it without any residents in situ. All the property’s other occupants had moved on, but the couple for a long time steadfastly declined to leave. Following their eventual departure, they launched proceedings.

Ruling on the matter, the judge found that the landlord was prepared to use whatever means were at his disposal to secure their departure. He conducted a campaign to make their lives uncomfortable enough to drive them from their flat. Amongst other things, he cut off their internet service, switched off their gas boiler and installed CCTV in the property for no good reason. He made vile and malicious allegations against them and regularly reported them to the police, who unsurprisingly took no action.

He and others made frequent, unnecessary visits to the flat, gaining unwarranted entry, often without notice. There was no desistence from such conduct, even after he was told that the couple were expecting their first child. When they still did not move out, he took matters into his own hands and decided to eject them himself.

He or his agents changed the locks whilst the couple were out and dumped some of their belongings outside. Having nowhere else to go, they regained access and tried to continue living in the flat, placing cardboard on the floor in lieu of a bed. Only after they were offered temporary council accommodation did they finally move out.

The court found that the landlord’s reprehensible conduct was designed to oust the couple by unlawful means by doing whatever was necessary, however improper, to secure that end. It constituted harassment and trespass to both property and goods. He repudiated the lease and breached the couple’s right to quiet enjoyment of their home. He delayed performance of his legal obligation to protect their deposit.

The landlord was ordered to pay the couple more than £45,000, including £25,000 for the anxiety they endured and £10,000 in aggravated and exemplary damages. Such an award was, the court found, amply justified.

When making your will, you may, for one reason or another, choose to distribute your estate unevenly between your loved ones. However, as a High Court ruling showed, you are under an overriding duty to make reasonable provision for members of your family and anyone else who depends upon you financially.

By his will, a man bequeathed £10,000 to each of his three adult children. He left the remainder of his estate, which was worth about £475,000 in total, to his daughter. His two sons subsequently launched proceedings under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 on the basis that the will did not provide for their reasonable needs. They valued their claims against the estate, in total, at more than £250,000.

Ruling on the matter, the Court noted that the man had evidently decided to leave the lion’s share of his estate to his daughter because he regarded his sons as not having behaved well. He was only deterred from cutting his sons out of his will altogether by a solicitor’s sensible advice.

Rejecting the younger son’s claim, the Court noted that he owned his family home and two other properties, with combined equity in the region of £240,000, together with his own profitable business. His income was relatively modest but was sufficient to meet his reasonable needs both now and in the foreseeable future. The gift of £10,000 was sufficient to make reasonable provision for him.

The older son was in a very different position in that he was chronically disabled and dependent on others’ help for many day-to-day tasks. In receipt of benefits, he lived with a friend in her housing association property. From the fact that he had sufficient spare cash to spend on gambling, the Court inferred that he had more than enough money to meet his current, modest needs. On the other hand, his condition was likely to deteriorate in the future, resulting in an increasing need for care.

In awarding the older son an additional £25,000 from the estate, the Court found that it was unreasonable for his particular needs relating to his disabilities not to have been recognised in the will. The money would be placed in trust to cover his care costs. Any sum remaining in the trust fund on his death would revert to his sister.

Many neighbours’ disputes may, at least to an outsider, appear trifling. However, as a High Court ruling showed, they matter very much to those involved and, in the absence of amicable negotiation, they can very easily become ruinously expensive.

A landowner asserted that his neighbours’ right of way over a track that crossed his land was limited to a width of 2.15 metres. The neighbours, however, asserted that the correct figure was 2.5 metres. The dispute blew up into full-scale litigation after the landowner erected steel bollards at each end of the track that only permitted vehicles the width of a quad bike to pass by.

Following a trial, the neighbours succeeded on the principal issue concerning the track’s width. Although certain other issues were decided against them, the judge ordered the landowner to pay 75 per cent of their legal costs. Both sides sought to challenge aspects of the judge’s ruling but, after detecting no legal flaw in his conclusions, the Court rejected their appeals.

The Court noted that the neighbours had incurred legal costs of £427,000 in fighting the case, not including the costs of the appeal. The landowner’s costs budget was £218,000, but his bill was estimated to be up to 10 per cent higher than that. Emphasising that the dispute had been conducted in an entirely disproportionate way, at entirely disproportionate cost, the Court hoped that any further disagreements arising could be resolved in a sensible and amicable fashion, without further expense.

So-called ‘cowboy’ builders who demand overpayment for delayed and shoddy work are a curse on householders. However, as a Court of Appeal ruling showed, the law takes a tough line with dishonest tradespeople.

The case concerned a builder’s work for four clients, performed at a cost of almost £35,000. In each case, he presented himself as a solvent and stable businessman although that was far from being the case. The clients complained that his faulty work was long delayed and left incomplete.

One client received an electric shock each time she touched a washing machine he had installed. He left another client’s home uninhabitable so that she and her children were left homeless and had to move in with her ex-husband for months. She spent her life savings to get her home back into some sort of order.

After he was prosecuted, the builder pleaded guilty to engaging in unfair commercial practice, contrary to the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008. The Regulations require tradespeople to exercise skill and care in their work, to adopt honest market practices and to observe the general principle of good faith.

In sentencing him to nine months’ imprisonment, a judge noted that he had strung along and grossly misled all four clients. Making false promises, he simply ignored their concerns. Each of them was asked for more money and at least one of them was asked for cash in order to evade VAT. He behaved aggressively to one of the clients before walking off the uncompleted job.

Ruling on his appeal against the sentence, the Court had no doubt that the custody threshold was passed given the litany of wreckage and disaster he had left behind him. It was no excuse for him to argue that he was a victim of his own success, in that his business had mushroomed to the point where he was unable to keep pace with his commitments. It was a case of excessive greed rather than a businessman getting out of his depth. The judge’s decision that only immediate custody would suffice as punishment could not be faulted.

Cutting his sentence to six months, however, the Court noted his powerful personal mitigation. He was of previous good character and had received numerous positive references. He had performed charity work and had a sound working history, and his imprisonment would impact on his young family. He had wisely decided that he no longer wished to run his own construction company.