Cases - Lehmann v Herman

Record details

Name

Lehmann v Herman

Date

[1993]

Citation

1 EGLR 172

Legislation

Party Wall etc. Act 1996

Keywords

Party wall - notice must be served on all parties - owner now includes purchaser of an interest in the land

Summary

The defendants, Mr and Mrs Hermann, owned a long lease of a flat in property separated from the plaintiffs' premises by a party wall. The defendants proposed to carry out certain works and a party structure notice was served by Mr Hermann only.

The judge decided that the notice was invalid as it had been served by only 1 of 2 joint tenants. He considered that, in the case of joint tenants, it could not be said that only one of them occupied or was in possession of the flat. He accepted the argument that a building owner must mean the owner of any layer of ownership (such as the freehold layer or the leasehold layer), but decided that the building owner included everyone within that layer.

The judgment stated that a person is not entitled to serve a notice as building owner before they have exchanged contracts for a lease of property as they do not fall within the definition of 'owner'. This situation has now changed as the 1996 Act includes a 'purchaser of an interest in land under a contract for purchase or under an agreement for lease'.