DAEJAN PROPERTIES LTD v SEAN GERALD GRIFFIN ALPHONSA MATHEW
Decision date: 14 May 2014
Neutral citation: [2014] UKUT 206 (LC)
Overall AI summary confidence: high
Short overview
This short overview is intended to summarise the case, issues and outcome so far as they are supported by the judgment.
AI confidence in this short overview: high
This appeal concerned whether a landlord could recover service-charge contributions for emergency and remedial works replacing concealed corroded steel beams and a parapet at Crown Terrace, and whether the LVT's s.20C order refusing recovery of certain pre-LVT costs was just. The Upper Tribunal held the landlord was obliged to repair, allowed recovery of the Phase 1–5 costs and related professional fees in full, set aside the LVT's s.20C order but made a limited s.20C order covering the LVT-stage costs only, and found only lessees under form E leases were contractually liable to contribute to the landlord’s legal costs.
Ratio decidendi
This summary is intended to identify the ratio decidendi, meaning the legal reasons for deciding and the binding part of the decision.
AI confidence in this ratio decidendi summary: high
Where concealed structural elements corrode, a landlord’s repairing covenant can give rise to a recoverable obligation even without actual notice; assertions that earlier repair or a single tendered programme would have materially reduced costs must be established by evidence rather than assumed. Emergency remedial work necessitated by a sudden failure of concealed elements that would in any event have required replacement does not automatically make increased costs irrecoverable from tenants.
Obiter dicta
This summary is intended to identify obiter dicta, meaning observations made by the way that were not necessary to deciding the case and are not binding.
AI confidence in this obiter dicta summary: medium
Comments indicating that a landlord’s opportunities for inspection (for example during other works) and any delay in acting on professional advice are relevant considerations in the just and equitable exercise of discretion under s.20C, and that broad percentage-based reductions for economies of scale or profit-margin adjustments are unreliable absent detailed invoice-level analysis, appear as non-binding observations.