Remember that as part of your lease, we have a nomination period of eight weeks to find you a buyer for your share.
Therefore the person selling to you must be prepared to wait until we have found you a buyer for your home or you risk losing mortgage and solicitor’s fees if they decide to pull out. Once a buyer is attached the normal selling process will then take a minimum of eight weeks.
This is an administration fee which covers the costs involved in working to find a buyer for your property.
We will charge you the fee which is listed in your lease. An estate agent would typically charge much more than your resale fee; overall, this fee makes sure that we can continue helping other people onto the property ladder.
We need a valuation from an independent surveyor that has a Royal Institute of Charted Surveyors Certificate because they refer to the government's Red Book which determines the exact value of the property, where as an estate agent assumes the price is open to negotiation.
Estate agents generally add 10% to the price they think a home is worth so that buyers can knock something off. With Shared Ownership the price is fixed so both sides know what they are getting.
We need a valuation from an independent surveyor that has a Royal Institute of Charted Surveyors Certificate because they refer to the Governments Red Book which determines the exact value of the property, where as an estate agent assumes the price is open to negotiation.
Estate agents generally add 10% to the price they think a home is worth so that buyers can knock something off. With Shared Ownership the price is fixed so both sides know what they are getting.
Your valuation is valid for three months from the date of your report. After this you can get an updated report if you need to. If you already have a buyer attached to your property and your valuation expires you do not need to get an updated report but, you can if you choose to.
You were helped to buy your home with public money, which your local authority provides to help people who need housing. One of the conditions of your local authority providing the money was that the home would be offered in the future to the person who needs it the most.
Just as you benefited, we now have a duty to help other people. We currently have a database of people waiting to purchase a shared ownership home. If you decide to sell your home, it is a condition of your lease that you give us the opportunity to find a buyer from our database first.
If no-one is interested in your home after the first viewing, we may still be able to help. People join our list every day and we use a number of online portals as well as work closely with the local authority, therefore we would encourage you to hold another viewing.
If we still can’t find a buyer, we can give you permission to sell on the open market through an estate agent. We will give you advice if this happens. We want to be reasonable, if we can’t find a buyer, we’ll let you know as soon as we can. You can then choose to sell your share through an estate agent or you may be able to sell 100% of your property. It depends on your lease restrictions.
If you sell your share on the open market, we will want to interview your buyer to make sure they are eligible and can afford the payments on shared ownership. We will explain this further if we give you permission to sell on the open market.
We won’t charge our resale fee if you sell this way, but you will have to pay fees to an estate agent if you use one. Please note when selling your share only you must only accept the market value price as determined by the RICS surveyor.
If you sell 100% on the open market, you will need to buy the remaining shares of your property (this is known as ‘staircasing’).
You don’t have to raise the money yourself; your solicitor will use the money from your buyer on the day the sale completes. We will need a valid valuation report on completion to confirm that the agreed sale price reflects prices on the current market. We won’t charge our resale fee if you sell in this way, but you will have to pay fees to an estate agent if you use one.
On some homes, you can never own 100% so you won’t have the option of staircasing to 100% and selling on the open market. This only applies to a small number of homes. Your solicitor should have told you about this at the time you bought your home.