Sarah Woolnough - Legal Assistant

Areas of Specialism

Residential Landlord and Tenant Disputes

Career

Sarah Woolnough advises on Residential Landlord and Tenant disputes; Sarah joined the Landlord and Tenant disputes team at Furley Page in 1998.
 
Sarah’s work  covers preparation of agreements for occupation of residential property whether through tenancy agreements, licence agreements or house sharing agreements.  Sarah also works for her clients in resolving disputes between landlords and their tenants.  Most clients are landlords, many of whom have multiple properties.  In addition to drafting documents for her clients, Sarah also takes Court proceedings on behalf of landlords when necessary.  This may be because a tenant refuses to vacate a property at the end of their tenancy or if they get into rent arrears or become ‘nuisance’ tenants.
 
Sarah can deal with the proceedings from drafting the documents and issuing the claim in the County Court through to appearing in Court for her clients before the District Judge to obtain a possession order and, if necessary, obtaining a judgment for the rent arrears.
 
Another area of work dealt with by Sarah is squatter proceedings.  These proceedings are issued where trespassers have moved into a client’s property or, in the case of travellers or gypsies, they have moved on to a client’s land without permission.  In these types of cases the Court proceedings are dealt with swiftly to ensure a person’s property or land is returned to them in the shortest time possible.  Sarah deals with the drafting and issuing of the paperwork and, once a possession order is obtained, arranges for the Court bailiff to attend, accompanied by the police where necessary, to enforce the order and evict the squatters.

Increasingly Sarah receives instructions to assist clients where they have boundary issues or become embroiled in neighbour disputes over boundaries or planning issues for extensions or conservatories.
 
Sarah can also assist clients in making or objecting to a claim for adverse possession.  Adverse possession claims can be brought when a person has been in occupation of a piece of land or property for a period of 12 years or more and they want to be registered as owner of that land or property.