Right to Buy

Buying your Council Home

We understand that purchasing a home can be one of the most important decisions you make, and you may be entitled to get financial help from several government schemes to help you buy a home. These include help to buy, right to buy and shared ownership.

What is the Right to Buy Scheme?

Under the government-backed ‘Right to Buy Scheme’, secure tenants of council properties and some housing association properties have the legal right to purchase the property they are living in at a discounted price. Under the scheme, when buying your home you may be entitled to receive a discount of up to 70 percent of the property value, as long as it does not exceed a total sum of £108,000 in the London area or £80,900 outside of the London area.

With the cost of house prices in London being some of the most expensive in the country, this can be a welcome relief for those tenants wanting to become homeowners. However, if you are interested in using the right to purchase initiative to buy the property you currently rent, it is important that you seek advice from a property solicitor to help you complete the process.   

Right to Buy Conveyancing Solicitors 

Our experienced right to buy property team are experts in council property and housing association right to buy property transactions and can help ensure your house purchase runs smoothly. Get in touch with our property lawyers, in Brixton, who can provide further guidance on the right to buy scheme and help you throughout the conveyancing process. 

For further details about the right to buy scheme and how our solicitors can help you take advantage of it, call our team who will be happy to help call us on 0207 095 5700 or make an enquiry here.

Do I have the Right to Buy My Council Home?

If you are a council tenant, it is likely you will qualify for the right-to-buy scheme; however, there will be specific requirements that will vary based on whereabouts in the UK you live.

Our property team in Brixton can help you with advice on this, but it is likely that you will be eligible to buy your council or housing association home if for example:

·       It is your only or main home

·       It is self-contained

·       You are a secure tenant

·       You have had a public sector landlord (such as a council, housing association or NHS trust for example) for three years

You may also be able to make a joint application with someone who shares your tenancy, or up to 3 family members who have lived with you for the past 12 months (even if they do not share your tenancy). There is also the ‘Preserved Right to Buy’ initiative, which is available if your home used to be owned by the council, but they sold it to another landlord (like a housing association) whilst you were living in it, and you can find out from your landlord if this applies to you.

Even if you were not living in your home at the time it was sold by the council, you may still be able to buy it through the ‘Voluntary Right to Buy’ scheme if: 

·       You live in a housing association property in one of the scheme’s local authority areas

·       You have been a public sector tenant (usually of a housing association or council) for a total of at least 10 years

Expert Property Lawyers in Brixton 

Do not be put off if find the process a little confusing, our experienced and approachable right to buy lawyers are on hand to provide you with all the information you need on all the options available to you in a way that will be clear and easy to understand. We are here to take as much worry out of the conveyancing process as possible. Wainwright & Cummins LLP are an established London law firm of conveyancing solicitors in Brixton, and we are accredited by The Law Society’s Conveyancing Quality Scheme so you can be sure of receiving a high level of service, at competitive rates and you will always be fully aware of all the costs involved. 

Our Conveyancing Fees 

We will always make sure that our fees are clear and easy to understand, without any hidden charges and we will provide you with a personalised quote for your property matter. For sale and purchase of a residential property, we tend to work to fixed fees and you can find full information on the fees we charge by visiting our fees page. 

Contact our Property Team

To obtain a quotation for your property sale or purchase or to speak to one of our experienced property lawyers in Brixton you can call us on 0207 095 5700 or make an enquiry here.

Our other Legal Services

We pride ourselves on providing our clients with a complete legal service, covering all the legal matters that you may require. When purchasing a property, we realise there may be other matters you would like to discuss with us, or that the property sale or purchase may be as a result of another legal issue that we can assist you with. Our experienced legal team can also help with matters such as Probate and estate administration, Divorce and Family law matters.