Joseph has a wide range of property experience acting for various Anglican dioceses on their diocesan and school property portfolios as well as for developers, City of London Livery companies and both large and small charities on all facets of acquiring, leasing, charging, managing and disposing of property.

Joseph advises clients on acquisitions and disposals (including at auction), leases and development opportunities with complex property documentation, including option and conditional and development agreements (involving complex overage/clawback arrangements); he advises on appropriate Charities Acts requirements or Church of England Measures as appropriate.

For a significant number of landlords as well as tenants, Joseph has also acted on enfranchisement and lease extension matters (as well as sales and purchases pursuant to the right of first refusal procedure).

Recent Experience

• Acting for school site trustees in Kent in relation to a former school site, sold to a developer, involving complicated issues concerning the application of reverter, the School Sites Act 1841 and the payment of monies to the local authority on completion of a statutory transfer of the new school site under the School Standards & Framework Act 1998… all coupled with acting for the trustees and the academy trust company on the conversion of the school to academy status!
• Acting for an educational charity on its acquisition of an office block between St Paul’s Cathedral & the Millenium Bridge for wholesale refurbishment and then use for its headquarters and ancillary commercial uses.
• Acting for the local Incumbent and the Diocesan Board of Finance on the disposal of part of a churchyard and adjoining listed former school building to a developer subject to a faculty for works.
• Acting for school site trustees on statutory transfers of (part of) school sites where the extent is disputed with the local authority and obtaining multiple directions from the Secretary of State (in support of the trustees) to the local authority to comply with its statutory obligations.