Simon Hartley

Formerly of RadcliffesLeBrasseur, Simon is a Partner in our property litigation team, providing comprehensive advice on all aspects of contentious commercial real estate work.

Recognised as a leading expert in the London market, Simon has substantial rent review experience working for landlords and tenants both in and outside the capital. He advises in relation to rights of light, nuisance, possession claims, overage and emergency injunctions.

Simon has considerable expertise in acting for landlords, tenants and insolvency practitioners in relation to real estate disputes in an insolvency context. He also acts in relation to the enforcement of security held over property assets.

Additionally, he is involved in all aspects of contentious real estate management work, including lease renewals, dilapidations, restrictive covenants and easements.

Simon originated the concept of terminal dilapidations insurance, an innovative insurance product that allows the tenants of commercial premises to cap their lease liabilities for disrepair at the end of a tenancy. He was on the founding committee of the non-profit Dilapidations Association, which was created in 2017 to promote opportunities for mutual discussion and learning for all professionals involved in commercial disrepair and reinstatement disputes.

Simon has acted for clients on a range of contentious matters:

• Advising an international investment bank in relation to cross border insolvency and transactional structuring issues arising out of the multi-million-pound acquisition of its European headquarters.
• Representing the landlord on a rent review arbitration regarding the lease of a large retail site on Oxford Street, London.
• Acting for the owner of one of the world’s most prestigious retail and leisure locations in relation to professional negligence claims and property management issues.
• Representing an insurer and its insured firm of surveyors in relation to the successful settlement of a major professional negligence claim arising from the attempted exercise of a number of lease break options.
• Acting for an international corporate in a professional negligence claim against its solicitors arising from the invalid exercise of a number of lease break options.
• Advising a property investment fund on investing in non-performing loans secured over commercial, residential and buy-to-let property.
• Successfully defending a developer facing a challenge to the validity of a light obstruction notice.
• Securing the retention of a right to run a railway line over land subject to a compulsory purchase order for one of the UK’s largest corporates.
• Acting for a leading corporate in an arbitration and parallel independent expert determination concerning a sale of land and advising on an associated professional negligence claim.
• Representing the successful party in the Court of Appeal in the important land registration case Barclays Bank v Guy [2008] EWCA Civ. 452.

Simon represents clients in many commercial sectors including real estate, retail and leisure and healthcare. He also acts for tenants, many of them private clients, and landlords, including leaseholder-owned companies, in relation to residential property. This work includes enfranchisement, lease extensions, rights to manage and first refusal, service charge disputes and possession claims.