It’s about a month since the last news here, so an update is due.
Almost all of the forty-eight personal owners at Little Meadow have now paid directly to LMC’s own company bank account their Service Charges for the first half-year 1st October 2023 to 31st March 2024. The very few that remain outstanding will have received a follow-up reminder email and they have been asked to pay as soon as possible.
Aster Housing Association will also be settling the charges shortly for each of their twenty-seven properties, but the change of payee from FirstPort to LMC has meant a short delay while the new details are checked and added to their system for each individual property. The relevant tenants/part-owners will be contacted directly by Aster for settlement of their total charges; that’s if they’ve not had something already.
A full list of owners’ names and email addresses has been compiled by LMC in the absence of any help whatsoever from FirstPort and so we are almost ready to hand over the day-to-day work and future invoicing to our new managing agent, although settlement will continue to be directed to LMC’s own bank account. The new appointment will take place in early January 2024 when our current contract lapses. The directors are meeting on-site with the new agent on 6th December 2023 and we’re currently agreeing the wording of the management contract. The change of managing agent should be a breath of fresh air after the dreadful experience we have had with FirstPort.
On that subject, FirstPort have continued to be unhelpful to the point of being obstructive, but within the last week we were finally sent a timetable for ending our involvement with them. They have a lot of work to do before the split and, after it takes place, detailed accounts will be prepared and there will be a final payment of LMC’s money to LMC’s own bank account – this will include any accrued sinking fund. We anticipate some “robust discussions” before we get everything agreed.
After receiving Little Meadow owners’ payments LMC finally has some money available and we’re bringing on board the local company Craig Dunkley Landscaping. They did the final grass cutting of the season for us after Allwinds abandoned Little Meadow (we suspect that was because they hadn’t been paid by FirstPort) and in future they will be coming regularly. If you’re on FaceBook you can see their page by clicking here.
We are also getting some quotes to put right some of the other outstanding issues that have been reported to us so that these can be rectified without too much further delay.
The saga with the remaining Bellway issues continues, so unfortunately we have seen very few changes to some of the areas of Little Meadow that are crying out for attention. Many promises have been made by Bellway but few have been actioned, so there is still a lot for them to do. The latest plan was that work to resolve matters was to start on 6th November 2023 but that date came and went with almost nothing happening and anyway, Bellway never released to LMC the full list of what they intended to do. As we’ve indicated before, our preference would be for Bellway to pay LMC a sum of money to cover everything that needs to be done and for LMC to make the necessary arrangements – all we can say is that we continue to put pressure on Bellway to do something! The directors simply cannot understand why Bellway doesn’t get a grip, do what’s needed and then finally be free of their responsibilities at Little Meadow – that seems to us to be the obvious solution.
The transfer of the common areas of land from Bellway to LMC is at last beginning to move forward, albeit at a snail’s pace. We are currently waiting for IBB Law, Bellway’s solicitors, to send us the Land Registry TP1 transfer agreement for review.
Finally, we are told that the adoption of Marjoram Avenue by Waverley Borough/Surrey County Council has been agreed between the various parties after Bellway made a final payment to conclude matters. So the road adoption should now proceed without any further hiccups although we need to remember that local authorities are not renowned for their ability to do things quickly!