Who we work with

We aim to provide a first-class management service, whatever service we are providing. Our locally-based, professional property managers work closely with our clients to deliver a proactive and responsive service.

With Kingston, you’re in safe hands. We provide a personalised, hands-on service, meaning we can more readily identify, understand and respond to our customers’ needs.

An individual Property Manager will be appointed the main point of contact and regular inspections are undertaken to ensure services are being provided and that repairs have been carried out effectively, in line with your service levels.

What you see is what you get. Honesty and reliability are central to the way we do business. We provide an efficient and cost-effective service, designed to meet and exceed the exacting requirements of our clients.

Kingston are the first choice of most house builders in the North of England.

From large national companies to smaller bespoke companies, we work with the developers from the planning stage to ensure we provide an effective bespoke service for each site that we manage.

This ensures clients know exactly what services Kingston will be providing on site along with the expected costs.

Kingston manage portfolios for some of the most prestigious ground rent investors in the country, offering a bespoke, professional service that is tailored to our clients’ needs.

We’ll work not only with you, but also with your leaseholders to ensure you’re not distracted by day-to-day issues, enabling you to concentrate on your core business of developing your property portfolio.

We manage a diverse range of properties, from small house redevelopments to large, purpose-built apartment blocks. This expertise means our management services are efficient and hassle-free.

Are you unhappy with the management of your property? Take control of your own development.

Allow us to help you through the process, we’ll…

• Navigate the Right to Manage process from start to finish on your behalf.
• Explain everything to you in plain English, without the jargon.
• Tailor our services according to what you need.
• Price with transparency.

What is Right to Manage?

• The Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002 allows some leasehold property owners to take over the management of the building – even without the agreement of the landlord – via the transfer of the landlord’s management functions to a Right to Manage (RTM) company set up by the leaseholders.
• This new right was introduced not just as a means of wresting control from bad landlords, but also as a way of empowering leaseholders, who generally hold the majority of value in the property, to take responsibility for the management of their block.
• The right to manage is available to leaseholders of flats, but not leaseholders of houses.

The Right to Manage process:

• The process is relatively simple. The landlord’s consent is not required, nor is any order of court.
• There is no need for the leaseholders to prove mismanagement by the landlord. The right is available, whether the landlord’s management has been good, bad or indifferent.
• The process is carried out by serving a formal notice to the landlord, and after a set period of time, the management transfers to the RTM company.
• Once the RTM has been transferred, the landlord is also entitled to membership of the company.

Things to consider

There are important issues to consider and a substantial amount of work to be done before serving the notice, if the takeover of management is successful:

• The building must meet certain conditions and a minimum number of leaseholders are required to take part. At least two-thirds of the flats must be let to ‘qualifying tenants’* – it can be part-commercial, but the non-residential part can’t exceed 25% of the total floor area. RTM doesn’t apply where the immediate landlord of any qualifying tenant is a local housing authority.
• The Right to Manage may only be carried out by a RTM company, and the company members must have a sufficient number of qualifying tenants. The minimum number of qualifying tenants must be equal to at least half the total number of flats in the building. The right relates to a building, so in an estate of separate blocks, each block would need to qualify separately, and an individual RTM notice would be served. In the case of an estate of flats under the same management, it would be sensible to take over the management of the whole estate, but this would have to be done by application for each separate block.

Kingston may be able to assist you with funding the RTM process. To discuss this further, please contact us.

*A ‘qualifying tenant’ is a leaseholder whose lease was originally granted for more than 21 years. There’s no requirement for any past or present residence in the flats, or any limit on the number of flats that can be owned by one person.