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Many householders are familiar with the often traumatic experience of falling out with builders. However, as a High Court case showed, if their work is not up to scratch or left unfinished, lawyers will bend every sinew to ensure that fair compensation is paid. A homeowner engaged builders to perform major construction works on her property, including the erection of a kitchen extension and bathroom refurbishment. She also commissioned the manufacture and installation of triple-glazed windows, bi-fold doors and other glazing works. After she launched proceedings, it was common ground that...

Judges frequently impress on divorcing couples that it is in their own best interests to put conflict behind them and focus on achieving a sensible resolution. However, as a case in which a couple spent £8.4 million fighting over money and their children's future showed, such blandishments all too often fall on deaf ears. The very wealthy couple enjoyed an exceptionally lavish international lifestyle during their long marriage, which yielded four children. The marriage came to an end when the husband unilaterally divorced the wife in a foreign land where...

There is a big difference between moral and legal obligations. The High Court made that point in finding that mirror wills signed by a married couple did not impose on either of them a binding obligation not to change their bequests in future, save by their mutual consent. The couple attended a solicitor's office and made mirror wills whereby each of them left the entirety of his or her estate to the other. The effect of the wills was that, when the second of them died, all that remained of...

Residential landlords who neglect their legal obligations to the point of criminality can be hit with banning orders that are likely to put them out of business. In a case of importance to property professionals, the Upper Tribunal (UT) for the first time considered an appeal against one such order. The case concerned a woman who had been a landlord for over 30 years and owned 29 rental properties, many of them houses in multiple occupation. She specialised in letting to tenants who might otherwise find it difficult to obtain...