Your leasehold services

Extending your lease

Once the length of your lease drops below 80 years, it can become more expensive to extend making it more difficult to secure a mortgage.

To qualify for an extension, you must have owned the property for at least two years. You do not need to be resident at the property, you just need to own it.

How to calculate the years on your lease

The Right to Buy scheme which the property was sold under was introduced in 1980, with a typical 125-year lease granted for the first property sold in the block or estate. The date the first property is sold in the block or estate is ‘the commencement date’.  

To calculate how many years are left on your lease you must use the commencement date and not the date you purchased the property.

Number of years you can extend

We offer an additional 90 years to the remaining term, so if there are 80 years remaining, the new lease will expire in 170 years. This offer is fixed for six months, if you reapply after this time then you will need another valuation.

The cost

The costs of extending your lease is called 'the premium'. An average premium with approximately 80 to 90 years left on the lease, can cost £2500 to £6500. The exact valuation is calculated at the time of request and the premium is based on the remainder of the lease term and the property value.  

Additional legal costs

You are also responsible for paying:

  • our legal fee: £1000
  • surveyor’s fee: £250

If you decide to extend your lease

You can request an extension to your lease using one of the following routes:

Informal route – if the extension is for yourself

  1. Contact the leasehold and home ownership team at hsg-servicecharges@croydon.gov.uk
  2. Ask the council for a premium quote, once agreed
  3. Instruct a solicitor to carry out the legal work on your behalf

Formal route – if the extension is part of a property sale

  1. Contact the leasehold and home ownership team at hsg-servicecharges@croydon.gov.uk
  2. Instruct a solicitor to serve us notice under Section 42 of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993. We will serve a counter-notice in response

Extending your lease when selling your property

If you are selling your property and the purchaser would like a longer lease, you do not have to extend the lease before you sell. Instead, you could serve a Section 42 Notice before selling the property and apply for a lease extension. 

This document can be assigned to the new lease by the solicitors and forwarded to us before the sale completes. If this is not done, then the new owner would have to wait two years before they can apply themselves.