Shared Ownership and Right To Buy schemes – overview

Shared Ownership:

If you can’t quite afford the mortgage on 100% of a home, the government-funded Help to Buy Shared Ownership offers you the chance to buy a share of your home (between 25% and 75% of the home’s value) and pay rent on the remaining share, which is owned by the Housing Association that runs that particular scheme. Later on, you could buy a bigger share when you can afford to. This is referred to as ‘staircasing’.

To learn more about the various government Help To Buy initiatives and find out how we can help you, please contact us or view our handy Affordable Housing FAQ sheets.

Right To Buy:

The Right to Buy scheme is a policy which gives secure tenants of councils and some housing associations the legal right to buy, at a large discount, the home they are living in.

The Right to Buy scheme was introduced in 1980 and gives qualifying social tenants in England the right to buy their home at a discount.

Secure tenants of local authorities (and non-charitable housing associations) have the right to buy if they have been public sector tenants for at least three years. The Right to Buy discount increases with the length of tenancy up to a maximum limit.