Welcome
This is a website for leaseholders who want to either buy the freehold, buy a share of freehold (through a process called collective enfranchisement) or simply extend their lease.
This website provides calculators that tell you how much you should expect to pay to buy the freehold or extend your lease. The simple versions will give you a reliable approximate range estimate. The advanced calculators will explain in full detail how the costs are calculated and provide you with more insight into how the calculation is made.
The three figures that you need to hand to calculate the cost to buy your freehold or extend your lease are
1. The current value of the property today.
2. The annual ground rent
3. The number of years currently left on the lease.
The Calculators
The formulas for the cost of extending the lease or buying the freehold have only small differences, but I have split them out into different calculators for ease of use. The formulas themselves are set out in law and cannot be changed, but they are arbitrary, bewilderingly complicated and contain lots of variables. These variables are subjective and often disputed and the formulas can be sensitive to slight changes in their values. This is what often leads to wildly different estimates from different people.
The formula also requires numerous other variables to be input (such as the expected percentage increase in property value that results from extending the leases of different lengths, along with forecasted long term interest rates and inflation rates) but the calculator will helpfully provide sensible default values for all these, based on precedents set in leasehold valuation rulings and on comprehensive research data. This will allow you to calculate an approximate cost quickly. If you want to check or challenge a figure that you have been quoted, the first step is to ask them to provide you with the values they used in their calculation. Then put them into this calculator and check the result. You could then challenge the values of individual variables and build your case from there.
As a leaseholder, the most important thing is to not let your remaining lease run shorter than 80 years, because there is a dramatic step cost increase if the lease is less than 80 years.
Disclaimer
I would strongly advise seeking legal counsel before making decisions based on the figures produced by these calculators.
Posted by Stephen Wilcock