Council leaseholders

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Selling or subletting your leasehold

As a leaseholder, you may sell your property and give the lease to a new owner at anytime. There are a number of things you need to think about.

Firstly, if you have only recently completed your purchase under the Right to Buy scheme you will probably have to repay some or all of the discount you received.

The amount of discount you have to pay back is a percentage of the property value on resale. This figure will be reduced by 20% for each full year after the original date of completion of the sale.

No discount is repayable after 5 years.

Buy back

You must first offer the property back to us. This condition applies if you wish to sell within the first 10 years of getting your property through the Right to Buy scheme.

This is referred to as the right of first refusal and means we have the first right to buy the property back at the full open market value price. We will let you know in writing, if we choose to exercise this right.

Things you need to tell

Your buyer will want details of:

  • the service charges
  • any service charge arrears
  • planned major works for which they might have to pay
  • buildings insurance and other information about the block and estate

These are called pre-assignment enquiries. Your solicitor should write to the Lands Registry for this information.

There is a charge for providing pre-assignment information.