What are you actually buying with a leasehold flat?
A leasehold flat is not the bricks. It is the right to occupy a defined part of a building for a fixed number of years, on the terms of a lease, granted by whoever owns the freehold. The lease is a contract: it sets out what you own, what the landlord owns, who repairs what, what you pay towards the building, and what you may and may not do. Every check below is a question about that contract or how it has been operated.
The freeholder may be an investor, a developer, a housing association, or a company owned by the flat owners themselves, which is what "share of freehold" means. The day-to-day management is often delegated to a managing agent. Their conduct shapes your experience of living there and your ability to sell later.
Almost every flat in England and Wales is leasehold; commonhold exists in law but is rare in practice. So the question is not whether to buy leasehold, but which flat, on which terms.
What are the seven checks?
Most of these can be answered in the first fortnight from the lease, the title register and the management pack, before you spend money on searches or a survey. They should be checked in week one, not week six.
| Check | Where to find it | What a problem looks like | What to do |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unexpired term | The lease and the leasehold title register | Under 80 years, or under 90 and no plan to extend | Price in the extension, or ask the seller to serve notice before completion |
| Ground rent and escalation | The lease; the management pack for what is actually demanded | Rent that doubles at fixed intervals, or rises with an index without a cap | Check lender acceptance; negotiate a deed of variation or walk away |
| Service charge history and reserve fund | Three years of accounts and the current budget in the management pack | Rising charges, no reserve, arrears across the building | Ask why; seek a retention or a price adjustment |
| Planned major works | Section 20 notices, the accounts and the seller's replies | A consultation notice already served, or works discussed but not yet costed | Agree who pays; a retention from the price is common |
| Freeholder and managing agent | Speed and completeness of the management pack; disputes disclosed | Slow, evasive or litigious management; a freeholder who cannot be found | Factor it into the price and the timetable |
| Alterations and consents | The lease's alterations clause; licences in the pack; the survey | Removed walls, new bathrooms or windows with no licence | Retrospective consent from the landlord, or an indemnity policy where appropriate |
| Fire and cladding position | Leaseholder deed of certificate, landlord's certificate, fire risk assessment, EWS1 where relevant | A building over the height threshold with unresolved cladding, or no certificates | Confirm Building Safety Act protections apply before exchange |
How long should the lease be, and what about the ground rent?
The unexpired term is the single fact that most affects what the flat is worth and whether a lender will lend. Our lease length guide explains why 80 years is the line, what marriage value is and how the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 changes the position once its valuation provisions are in force. For a buyer the rule is short: over 90 years is comfortable, 80 to 90 means planning an extension soon, and under 80 means pricing the extension into your offer and checking your lender's minimum term first.
The two-year ownership requirement before a leaseholder could claim a statutory extension was removed with effect from 31 January 2025 (section 27 of the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024, in force 31 January 2025, checked 19 September 2026), so a buyer can now start a claim as soon as they are registered. Even so, where the term is close to 80 years, ask the seller to serve the section 42 notice before completion and assign its benefit to you, because that fixes the valuation date on the better side of the line.
Ground rent is the second title-level fact. For leases granted before the Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Act 2022 came into force, the rent is whatever the lease says, and some leases say it doubles every ten or fifteen years. A doubling clause can make a flat unmortgageable regardless of the term, because the future liability compounds beyond what lenders accept, and it can bring the lease within the assured tenancy rules once the rent passes a threshold. If the clause is a problem, the answer is a deed of variation with the freeholder before exchange.
What do the service charge accounts tell you?
Ask for three years of service charge accounts and the current year's budget, not just the latest demand. You are looking for the trend, the size of the reserve fund and any mention of works still to come. A healthy reserve fund is a good sign: it means the building is being maintained from savings rather than emergency demands on leaseholders. No reserve fund means the next roof is a bill for whoever owns the flat when the scaffolding goes up.
A section 20 consultation notice under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 means major works are coming and someone is going to pay for them. Where the notice has already been served, the cost usually falls on the leaseholder in possession when the demand is made, so agree in the contract who bears it: a retention from the price, held by the seller's conveyancer until the final account, is the usual mechanism. Our service charges guide explains what a landlord can and cannot recover.
The management pack, often on the LPE1 form, is where most of this arrives. It is produced by the freeholder or managing agent, not the seller's conveyancer, and waiting for it is the most common reason leasehold purchases take longer than freehold ones. What is a leasehold management pack sets out what it should contain. A pack that arrives quickly and complete tells you something about the management; so does one that does not.
What about alterations, the freeholder and building safety?
Most leases prohibit structural alterations without the landlord's consent and many require consent for anything beyond decoration. Check that the removed wall, the new bathroom and the replaced windows had a licence to alter where the lease required one. Retrospective consent is usually obtainable for a fee, and where the landlord cannot be traced an indemnity policy may cover the risk; discovering the problem when you sell is far worse than dealing with it now.
The freeholder and managing agent matter because you will deal with them for as long as you own the flat, and your own buyer's conveyancer will deal with them when you sell. Ask the seller about disputes, tribunal applications and unanswered correspondence. A freeholder who has disappeared is a particular problem: consents cannot be obtained, and a lease extension then runs through a vesting order from the county court under section 50 of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993. The First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber), in Wales the leasehold valuation tribunal, sets the premium and any other sums due and approves the terms of the new lease, and once that amount is paid into court the new lease is signed by a person the court appoints (sections 50 and 51, checked 26 September 2026). When section 43 of the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 comes into force these applications will go to the tribunal instead; it was not in force on 26 September 2026. The person who has to be missing is the landlord who can actually grant the extension, which in a block with a head lease is not always the freeholder. Checked 19 September 2026.
Building safety is the newest check. For flats in buildings above the height or storey threshold, the Building Safety Act 2022 gives qualifying leaseholders protection from the cost of remediating cladding and certain other defects, but the protection depends on the lease being a qualifying lease and on the right certificates having been exchanged. A leaseholder deed of certificate completed by the seller, and a landlord's certificate, should be in the pack. Where a building has an external wall issue, the lender may also require an EWS1 form. Our leasehold conveyancing service raises all of these on the first day, because they cannot be left to the end.
What happens after you complete on a leasehold flat?
Completion is not quite the end. The lease usually requires notice of the transfer, and of any mortgage, to be served on the landlord within a set period, with a fee. Some leases require the buyer to enter into a deed of covenant with the landlord or a management company, and a restriction on the register may prevent HM Land Registry registering you as owner until a certificate confirming compliance is produced. Your conveyancer deals with these, but the fees are yours and should be on the completion statement.
Ground rent and service charge are apportioned at completion, so you pay from the day you own the flat. Expect the next demand to come to you, and keep the management pack and the lease with the deeds; your own buyer's conveyancer will ask for both.