Leasehold

A lease extract mentions a rent review and the survey is silent. Has the survey failed to value the rent, or is the clause for the solicitor?

The clause is for the solicitor. The survey has not failed to value the rent, because valuing a rent review was never its job. A lease extract that mentions a review is a legal clause. Silence in the survey is the survey staying off that clause. It has not priced the rent, not forecast a review, and not ignored a defect in the building by being quiet. The failure would be to pretend a condition report can construe the lease. It cannot. Hand the extract to the solicitor.

Last reviewed 24 October 2026. Written for buyers in England and Wales unless this answer says otherwise. No named surveyor has signed this page. It is general guidance, not a report on your house, and not legal advice.

What is the fuller explanation?

Ground rent and the way it is reviewed sit in the lease. The words may be short in an extract and long in the schedule. Either way they are for someone reading the lease as a lease. The surveyor walks the flat and the block. They do not advise on how a review operates, and this note will not invent the arithmetic. If the extract worries you, the worry is a legal one. It is not evidence that the survey missed a crack or a damp patch.

Ask the solicitor to read the review clause in the full lease, not only the extract, and to tell you what it does. Keep that advice off the survey. Do not ask the surveyor to fill the silence with a rent figure. There is no figure of that kind in the report, and none should be implied. The clause was left to the lease on purpose.

What should you ask your surveyor?

Did you leave the rent-review clause untouched on purpose?
Is the clause a matter for the solicitor rather than a missed valuation?
Have you avoided putting any rent figure into the survey?

What are the typical next steps?

Send the review clause to the solicitor with the full lease.
Do not ask the survey to value the ground rent.
Keep the survey for condition and the lease for the rent.

Costs vary with the building and with who you instruct. Where this page does not cite a published figure, ask the surveyor, a relevant specialist, or your solicitor for a written quote. Do not treat a forum average as the price.

Also asked about this

If the extract is only a sentence, can it be ignored?

Not on the survey's account. A short extract can point at a longer clause. The survey is silent because the clause is for the solicitor, not because a short sentence is harmless. Ask the solicitor to read the full wording. The survey has not valued it.

Does a quiet survey mean the rent never changes?

No. Silence is not a promise that the rent stays still. The survey has not read the review and has not valued it. Whether the rent changes is what the solicitor finds in the lease. The report's quiet line is not that finding.