Archive for March 2019

A successful day for the ‘meet gunnercooke’ event in Leeds

A successful day as gunnercooke hosted a fantastic meet the team launch in Leeds on 01 March. This lunchtime drinks and canapes event was hosted at the popular Blackhouse restaurant in the city centre. It was very well attended with a great mix of gunnercooke partners, clients, intermediaries and recruiters. Co-founder Darryl Cooke gave an […]

A Burning Issue – what happens if a property is damaged or destroyed between exchange and completion?

Most clients would expect that if the property is damaged or burns down, the sale goes off and the buyer can walk away. I hope most lawyers would know that under the standard conditions of sale, that is not the case. Until a few years ago, it was the case with residential property that if […]

Brexit may now be less Frustrating for Landlords

Landlords will welcome the ruling from Mr Justice Smith that Brexit does not operate to frustrate the terms of a lease. In the recently heard case concerning the European Medicines Agency (EMA) Headquarters in London, the Court ruled that European Organisations cannot use Brexit as an excuse to walk away from their leases. Background In […]

A Construction Viewpoint: Practical Completion – what is it?

A Practical Completion – An “agreement for lease”. From the name, a layman might assume that this document is the domain of a property lawyer, but as every wise property lawyer knows, it makes sense to get your construction colleagues involved on this one! Are you sure that construction terms in your Agreement for Lease […]

Restrictive Covenants: Don’t Just Ignore Them

In a recent case, the Court of Appeal has refused to release or modify restrictive covenants where a development was knowingly carried out in breach of the covenants. The public policy interest in allowing the development to go ahead did not justify the release of restrictive covenants where a developer deliberately built houses on land […]

Oops!… We did it again

It is a fact of life that mistakes happen when entering commercial agreements. Time is usually tight. Parties want to ‘get the deal done’ and profit from it. Without the luxury of time to patiently review, reread and crosscheck terms, miscommunications and misunderstandings can understandably creep in. Take the situation where one side thinks it […]

Are you being served?

Service of notices has always been a particularly litigious area, with best practice to instruct a professional to send the notice for you, not least because it is then covered by their indemnity insurance. However, a recent case has really highlighted why it is important to take advice when receiving notices either direct or through […]