The registered freehold owner of a house in Audley Street, London NW4, has launched an Appeal Court challenge to a Central London County Court ruling that the occupier of the top-floor flat had acquired a flying freehold of the premises by way of adverse possession.
The court was told that, in 1988, Samina Farooqui was let into possession of the flat, as a licensee, pending her intended purchase of a long lease from the owner, Surrinder Sandhu.
In the event, no contracts were exchanged and no lease was granted. In 1990, Miss Farooqui was reimbursed all the moneys she alleged she had paid towards the flat, but she continued to occupy it and to rent it out.
The county court judge found that Farooqui had demonstrated an intention to possess the flat and that her licence to occupy had come to an end in 1988, on a date when he held that the agreement to sell was no longer going to be put into effect, even though there was no written notice to that effect.
In the Court of Appeal, Marc Living, counsel for Farooqui, argued that the judge had erred in law to find that the licence had come to an end and to hold that it was capable of coming to an end “merely by implication and without notice”.
He claimed that the judge had erred in propounding a general rule that licences can impliedly determine on their own terms without the need for notice or even knowledge.
He argued that the general rule was that a licence could be brought to an end only by reasonable notice.
The hearing continues.
Sandhu and another v Farooqui and another Court of Appeal (Auld, Mummery and Chadwick LJJ) 3 March 2003.
References: PLS News 03/03/03
