Rip-off leaseholds pressure

PRESSURE is mounting on the UK’s competition watchdog to investigate the leasehold scandal that has left up to 100,000 families facing crippling ground rents.

Furious MPs accused developers, solicitors and investors of ‘deliberately running a racket’ to rip off customers and called on the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to take action.

It comes just days after the CMA rebuffed calls for it to step in, despite pressure from Housing Secretary James Brokenshire and an influential committee of MPs.

Officials claim there would be little to learn from a full-blown market study and have refused to countenance a new probe because of preparations for Brexit. But MPs yesterday insisted there was evidence of a ‘serious cross-market failure’ that required the CMA to step in.

Speaking in the House of Commons, they said elderly people were among those ‘hoodwinked’ into buying houses on leases and claimed tens of thousands of families might be victims of mis-selling.

Housing committee chairman Clive Betts said: ‘Developers have denied they deliberately mislead leaseholders but the number of near-identical stories reflects a serious cross-market failure.

‘We hope our call will act as pressure on the CMA to finally act.’