Shared Ownership

If you can’t afford to buy your first home in the usual way, there are government schemes which can help you get on the property ladder.

There are two types of home buy schemes to help you buy a property:

Equity Loans

Firstly an equity loan – known as Help to Buy, where the government assist with a loan towards the purchase price of a new build property and no fees are payable for five years. The current Help to Buy Scheme ends in March 2021. Although a new scheme will be set up in its place, this time it will only be available to first-time buyers and instead of a London/rest of UK divide, there will be regional price caps.

Shared Ownership

Secondly, there is shared ownership. Here, you buy a share in the property (usually between 25% and 75% of the full value). The property can be new-build or a resale property from someone already owning a shared ownership property who is moving on. The Housing Association owns the remaining share and you pay rent on that share. Shared ownership properties are always leasehold. As and when you can afford to buy more of the property (known as “Staircasing”). The share that you own goes up, and the rent that you pay goes down. There is no obligation to buy a further share at any time during your ownership. If you suffer hardships you can also downward staircase and sell part of your property back to the Housing Association.

Ellis Jones are pleased to confirm that we have specialist lawyers with many years of experience in these areas.

Ellis Jones are pleased to be included on the approved solicitors panel for (i) Sovereign Housing Association which includes Spinnaker, Signpost, Medina and Western Challenge Housing Associations, (ii) Radian which includes Drum, Longwood Park, Portal, Swaythling and Windsor Housing Associations, (iii) Sovereign which includes Twynham and The Vale Housing Associations and (iv) Thames Valley Housing Association.