The High Court has held that the tenants of a block of flats should have been offered first refusal of a lease of the airspace above the block under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 (LTA 1987). As such, the tenants were entitled to the lease, which had been granted to allow a developer to build additional flats on the roof of the block.

As well as considering the airspace above the block, the judgment also contains a useful analysis of whether the garages, yard, electricity sub-station and caretaker’s offices around the block of flats formed part of the block for the purposes of the LTA 1987.

Says Paul Cowdery, Partner, Clarke & Son LLP

Lawyers advising a landlord on the disposal of a property should consider carefully whether the disposal is within the scope of the LTA 1987, particularly when the disposal is of only part of the property.

Landlords who are granting leases of flats should take care over the rights granted in the lease. In this case, the fact that the garages were let on separate leases took them outside the scope of the LTA 1987. If the garages had been let in the same leases as the flats, they may well have fallen within the scope of the LTA 1987.