Our Real Estate Commercial Team recently completed the sale of a large number of office units in the Manchester on behalf of a developer following completion of the development. Our overall aim in this transaction was to facilitate a smooth transaction and realise our client’s capital on the sale, whilst remaining cost efficient.

There were a number of challenges throughout the sales, the more testing of which were as follows:

• The deducing (producing) of the legal title in the land to the purchaser’s solicitor. The title was exceptionally varied and complex. It comprised a number of registered titles combined with segments of unregistered land and various leasehold titles. It was necessary to dedicate sufficient time to this from the outset to produce a clear title and minimise requisitions being raised by the purchaser’s solicitors throughout.
• A mechanism for enforcing agreements. Various agreements (such as infrastructure and access agreements to facilitate access to the land prior to the road adoptions) had been entered into by our client with businesses that had now either dissolved or changed hands. Producing a method whereby these agreements could still be enforced by the purchaser was a further challenge. We adopted a pragmatic legal drafting approach here by creating a structure whereby the purchaser had the ability to enforce the agreements should it need to whilst protecting our client from being rendered financially liable for circumstances outside of its control. This was a win – win compromise.
• Obtaining third party consents. Due to the size and complexity of the title, there were various consents of third parties to be procured prior to completion. The challenge here was working with the third party representatives (not against them) to expedite the process of obtaining the consents and complying with an extremely tight time scale dictated by the purchaser’s solicitors. By working collectively with the relevant parties, being on hand to respond promptly to enquiries and utilising the most efficient means of communication, the consents were obtained within our time scales.
• The drafting of the legal documentation. The various proprietors and third parties with interests in the land necessitated the drafting of a number of deeds and agreements, constructed in a manner that was consistent and met the requirements of each party. Our experience in complex legal drafting and our vast precedent bank allowed us to achieve this in a timely fashion whilst remaining cost efficient.

The commitment of the team to pull together their expertise and meet the above challenges in a manner that adhered to the agreed time scales ensured a satisfactory and valued result for the client.