On the first day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a large glass of claret post-Budget. A second wine, mind you, as let's face it, few of us have had a bumper year in the London and country house market. A drink was rather in order though, after some agents said they had "never seen a market like it" and "it was worse than 2008". (The author confesses that she doesn't remember the market of 2008 professionally, and was instead enjoying her misspent youth, but she's willing to trust the grownups.) The Budget was something of a limping, confused creature, covered in depth elsewhere. Suffice to say, the claret seemed a fitting way to respond to the "death by a thousand cuts" for clients, with landlords facing increased income tax rates and a mansion tax that resembled a facial wart – relatively small but uncomfortably visible to the outside world. My true love (TL) winced at this simile and quietly topped up our glasses.
On the second day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a pre-Christmas exchange or two. Most clients decided to play "wait and see" for the Budget. While there were the ever-present pre-Budget transactions – some estate purchases exchanging in a week, with thanks to the team – many were "pens down" in October to be revived now, alongside a spate of new instructions. Some of those new instructions are for international buyers: US and Dubai investors in particular seem to perceive a market low and are seizing the opportunity to snaffle up PCL deals. Others are either the town or country gilet brigade (Patagucci or Schoffel, we don't discriminate) on the lookout for a deal or as a hedge against a frothy equity market (the author enjoys the term frothy because it reminds her of chai lattes and espresso martinis). Some are sales by trustees with little choice, often at a discount to heady Covid market highs (c.f. death by a thousand cuts, oh and Brexit, renters' rights, construction costs, extreme weather and poor harvests…). They all have one thing in common though – they all want it done this side of Christmas. It's good to maintain some nice British traditions.
On the third day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… an instruction to evict a difficult tenant. With the Renters' Rights Act coming into force in May 2026, the client was taking a long hard look at tenants before the ability to serve a section 21 notice evaporates. Fortunately, like every landlord ever to instruct the author, all papers were beautifully in order, with a full pack of the prescribed information, correctly protected deposit, up-to-date management packs, and even evidence of service on the tenant… or was a brief lucid dream inspired by the claret? Anyway, we hope the client has claret to hand when we explain that not only do all documents need to be re-served (and even then that may not save the day), but that the court backlog is growing and the cost of possession proceedings is likely to far outweigh the annual rent on the rural cottage. Renters' Rights will bring in some wider grounds for eviction, but the savvy clients are not taking their chances and are calling us now.
On the fourth day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a family farm partnership to restructure before April. With the incoming caps on Business Relief and Agricultural Property Relief, TL had been overheard in the village pub explaining how we were restructuring ownership of family farms to mitigate inheritance tax. TL also had some detailed commentary on which items of farm machinery might be used to impress upon the Chancellor the impact of the changes, but the author cannot recall specifics, as she was too taken by TL's recollection of how interests in farm partnerships might be settled in trust, gifts made to the next generation, or value shifted between family holdings. TL omitted to mention the pressure on valuers and the potential delay in getting valuations as the April deadline approaches, but at least the sensible clients were already scheduling meetings with their lawyers.
On the fifth day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a neighbour with a vineyard and hospitality startup. Having overhead TL in the pub, the neighbour, naturally present for narrative reasons, thought they might also take the opportunity to restructure their rural business before April. As a US person, the UK-US double tax treaty applied to their estate, with some helpful structuring opportunities. It transpired that the neighbour's son had put his Arts degree to good use designing a logo and brand name, but no one had thought to register those as trade marks. The team set merrily to work in registering them on both sides of the Atlantic, and including them in the restructuring, as brand is, after all, a business asset. (The author would like to note that she does not discriminate when it comes to countries of origin and also enjoys an English Pinot Noir or Californian Rioja.)
On the sixth day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a Forestry Commission inquiry. The author had been warned that the Forestry Commission had an enhanced budget to prosecute illegal felling. Disgruntled neighbours, fuelled by rage about potholes and golf club membership prices, were mistaking Ash dieback clearance for the Sycamore Gap felling. This was landing landowners with unexpected Forestry Commission inquiries and unjustified criminal charges, which said esteemed colleagues were defending, and others in our Reputation team were managing. Note to self: check the land agent on that pre-exchange purchase had all the felling licences in place, or else the buyer could face criminal charges – it’s a strict liability crime. No claret in prison.
On the seventh day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a lease of farm buildings. Well, not just any farm buildings, but some derelict, listed barns, set to be converted into premises for a local business and visitor centre. A tricky one, as ultimately a commercial lease, but not to be approached like an office block – a full institutional agreement for lease might spook the horses – and the author suspects that very few office blocks prelets are conditional on moving cattle. The visitor centre is for the adjoining rewilding project, and the estate's charity is going to take a rather tax-efficient lease of it to deliver public benefit by showing confused tourists a small, equally confused, newt. (No warranty is given that newts will be available for inspection.) The ecologist reports that the newts have missed the memo and don't want to live in the beautifully landscaped "scrapes" and are instead living in the ditch into which the old septic tank from the farm office unlawfully drains, so we need to rejig the boundaries and lease plans, and navigate responsibility for the potential pollution. The author pauses for a moment to appreciate the irony that the herd of stroppy dairy cattle are easier to move than the small amphibians.
On the eighth day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a country house sale to exchange in 48 hours. There's another buyer in the wings, TL tells me, and despite negotiations having continued on and off for the last few months, a few bidders have come forward at once. The client wants it done and the successful bidders' offer is based on getting it done quickly – very quickly. Fortunately we were expecting this, so have a full dataroom ready to go, even pre-empting the buyer's additional enquiries and requests for indemnity insurance policies. Despite a last minute retention for the upgrade of a non-compliant private drainage system, the sale exchanges within the deadline, and we all breathe a sigh of relief. Somewhere, someone opens a bottle of claret to celebrate, but we crack on in the office.
On the ninth day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… an urgent remortgage. TL (now also a mortgage broker – a person of many talents) has lined up an impressive offer from a lender, which consolidates all their existing lending – from chunky amortising debt from the last IHT bill, to the secured overdraft facility for the house opening business – and provides some further capital to pay off a divorcing spouse. The debt is to be secured on a rural estate, development land, and the "London pad" – a six-bed somewhere off the KR (the author mourns the original Ken Roof Gardens – c.f. misspent youth). We're used to refinancing estates at speed, and quietly pray to the gods of estate management that all the cottages have valid EPCs. Our family team handled the divorce, limiting the divorcing spouse's access to family trusts and upholding the pre-nup, but there's still some cash to find, and with the decent rate that TL has secured, the client's wealth manager advises them to borrow rather than cash in investments. Some investments are in startups thanks to EIS/SEIS planning, so we get our Innovation team take a look at the investment agreements and they red flag a few. The client, while grateful, notes that it might be a bit soon to use the term "red flags" as they re-enter the dating market. The author makes a note to float a Mishcon dating platform, complete with the background reviews from our Cyber and Reputation teams, then recalls our excellent "bloody difficult women" panel event (albeit about tackling misogyny), and strikes through the idea.
On the 10th day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… a newbuild London purchase. The construction and planning team chip in on the nicher nuances of London newbuilds, and the Tax team give the client a hand on the structuring. The property has been dressed for sale with the kitchen gadgets (the type the author has only ever seen on the 'gram), and an impressive display of art, which our client's agent negotiates as included in their offer. Wary that the apportionment for contents is reaching levels that might buy a decent two bed in zone 3, and that an unreasonable apportionment constitutes fraud for both client and conveyancer, the Tax team come in to take a look at reducing the SDLT bill. We run the terms past the Art law team to ensure the contract includes all the necessary bells and whistles. The Tax team write down the apportionment for SDLT to reflect depreciation for chattels and the fact the kitchen is fitted; the client still makes a good SDLT saving; and we all rest easy in defending an HMRC enquiry. The author briefly flirts with the idea of producing artwork of equivalent merit to that seen in the apartment (not a thought she shares with her better educated Art colleagues) and designs her dream Gaggenau kitchen before turning back to the finer points of the lease's service charge provisions.
On the 11th day of the Christmas season, my true love gave to me… another newt-based drama. This time, not content with a mildly polluted ditch, the newts are enjoying a pond in an old marl pit on the edge of some development land. While the client had briefly entertained using the land for BNG (#so2024), the pond and its adjoining water meadows are earmarked as SANGs to enable an adjoining development. The client's neighbour wants to put their allocated land forward for resi development with the client's newt-filled meadows, and we are looking at a land pooling arrangement to avoid double taxation on the equalisation payment. The planning consultants are worried about the newts, so we adjust the boundaries and calculations. The developer is also worried that some of the pits have been infilled over the years bringing potential contamination risks, so we seek bespoke contaminated land insurance. Behind the scenes, we rejig the family's interests to give the non-farming sibling the development sale proceeds, leaving the farming sibling with the land, and we put a call in to our in-house psychologist in MDR Mayfair to design a family constitution to avoid introducing the next generation to our litigation colleagues.
On the 12th day of the Christmas season, my true love was out of office, and my marketing team requested a few words for a newsletter. Unfortunately, the author was on her way to a PFL (if unclear please email) and set aside her detailed Budget analysis for a more light-hearted – and wholly fictional – recap of the last few months. Over lunch with a few of the best agents somewhere that bore an uncanny resemblance to the George in Stamford, the table agreed that new money was entering the agri market at an accelerated rate; that the country house would slowly bounce back; that the best succession in family businesses may be to divide siblings between verticals; that fast lawyers had the edge; and that good roast beef was a rare and special thing. And now, as the train whistles through Cambridgeshire back to London, the author sets down her virtual pen, glances at her diary and its three clashing client calls and BD events, then out at her real true love: the English countryside, and she looks forward to curling up by the fire on Christmas Eve with the dog, Saki's Short Stories, and a good glass of claret.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.