Setting up 18 studios, Long Eaton, Nottingham

After 3 gruelling days in court the Judge has managed to make sense of a badly drafted lease. He has also accepted the Factory Company have been charging for items which cannot be recovered through the service charge. This includes upgrading the landlords own properties, legal fees and anything to do with letting properties. This means our legal liability to pay the service charge has decreased dramatically. We didn’t win every point as we had argued that the Company lost the right to recover the service charge if an estimate was not produced as in 2007. As we had benefitted from the services I can see the point. ( Though our alternative position was we only had to pay what was legally due.) Confusing I know. The Judge also selected correspondence from the other side which demonstrated that the Company secretary and the chairman knew that the service charge needed to accounted for in a different way to the way it was being administrated in 2007. It’s a shame that the only way to challenge the service charge was through the courts which is costly in terms of money, time and emotional termoil. A costs hearing will be held in the next couple of months. So it isn’t over yet. And the worry still continues… Where does it leave us? Well the Counterclaim which threatened to close the studios was put to bed before it went to Court. The issue of planning was discontinued and consent for licences to alter and licences for the artists was agreed. We now have a service charge which relates to the true cost of providing the services. This blog was used as evidence to demonstrate that the Directors had seen the newly erected partitions and had been happy with the work.( www.a-n.co.uk/p/394956/2007.) They raised no objections to the studios until 2 years later through the Counterclaim. The use of the blog as evidence also made me feel more self conscious and cautious. Whilst we selected an entry to support our case, the flip side is that loose words can cost. I think it is time to wrap up now. I hope it hasn’t put anyone off setting up artist’s studios because despite everything I am proud of the achievement. I have to thank all the HMS artists who have been supportive…. They didn’t buy into all this. I can’t express how wonderful they have been. Also I would like to thank NFASP, Jonathon Harvey from Acme studios and David Manley from HMS who provided a statement to support our case. Also Susan Jones from AN who has been supportive. A BIG BIG THANK YOU !