Freehold vs leasehold: what it changes when you sell

Freehold means you own the building and the land it sits on. Leasehold means you own the right to use a property for a fixed term while someone else owns the land. On a sale, that difference decides what you transfer, what the buyer's solicitor checks, and how much say you have over the building.

What freehold and leasehold mean in England and Wales

Freehold is ownership of a property and the land it stands on, with no end date. Leasehold is a right to occupy a property for a fixed term, granted by the freeholder, who keeps ownership of the land and usually of the building structure. That one difference runs through everything else on this page.

Tenure is recorded in the register of title kept by HM Land Registry for England and Wales. Scotland and Northern Ireland run their own land registration systems, so the rules described here do not apply there.

Most flats are leasehold, and leasehold also appears on houses, particularly in parts of England. Under a lease you normally pay ground rent and a service charge, and you may need the landlord's consent for alterations or for some uses of the property. Government leasehold guidance sets out what leaseholders pay, what the landlord has to do, and how to extend a lease or buy the freehold. Freehold owners pay no ground rent to a landlord and need no consent for internal changes, subject to planning and building rules.

Both tenures can be sold. What changes is the sale itself.

What tenure changes when you sell

When you sell a leasehold home you transfer the remaining term of the lease, not the property outright, so the buyer's checks, the paperwork and the questions all follow that lease. A freehold sale transfers the property and the land with it, and no landlord sits in the chain.

In practice, a leasehold seller is usually asked for the lease itself, the service charge accounts, the ground rent position, and confirmation of who manages the building. The buyer's solicitor raises enquiries with the landlord or managing agent, and there may be a fee for supplying information, plus a notice or a consent if the lease requires one. How long that takes depends on how quickly the landlord or agent responds and on the terms of the individual lease, so no honest guide can promise a fixed period.

A freehold seller faces fewer of these steps, but not none. Title defects, rights of way and covenants can still slow a sale, and they sit in the title rather than in a lease.

Lease length and what buyers ask about

A lease runs for a fixed term, so the remaining length shortens every year, and buyers and their lenders look at what is left before they commit. How short a lease has to be before it becomes a problem varies between lenders and between properties, so treat any single threshold you read online with caution and ask the lender directly.

If the remaining term looks short to a buyer, expect them to ask you to extend the lease before exchange, to ask for a price adjustment, or to walk away. Extending a lease or buying the freehold is a formal process with its own rules, and the amount involved depends on the lease and the property. A qualified valuer advises on that, not an estate agent and not this site.

For a leasehold flat, the buyer also weighs service charges, ground rent and how the building is managed. For a freehold house, the equivalent questions are about boundaries, access and any covenants registered against the title.

How to check the tenure before you market a home

Tenure sits in the register of title, on the estate agent's particulars and in the legal pack, and it is one of the first things a buyer's solicitor checks. If you are selling, confirm it before you instruct anyone, because it changes the questions you will be asked and the documents you will need.

The register of title for a property in England and Wales is held by HM Land Registry. If you own the property, your own title documents state the tenure. If you are buying, ask the seller or the agent in writing and have your solicitor confirm it from the title rather than from a listing description.

Getting this wrong costs time rather than money. A sale agreed as freehold that turns out to be leasehold usually has to be renegotiated, and the buyer's searches and enquiries start again from the lease.

Tenure and the sold prices you can look up

Sold price data tells you what a property fetched, not how it was held, so tenure cannot be read off a price. Use sold prices to compare streets and areas, then check the title for the tenure of the specific property.

HM Land Registry publishes Price Paid Data and the UK House Price Index, and both feed the figures on this site. Our sold house prices pages show what individual homes changed hands for, and the house price map puts those sales in a geographic context. The methodology page explains which records we use and how we group them.

Tenure does affect value in some cases, particularly where a lease is short or service charges are high, but the effect shows up in what a buyer will pay for that particular property rather than in an average. To see how the numbers behave somewhere specific, look at a local page such as Northampton, where sales are grouped by area, or track the same street over several years. When you want to look at your own property rather than the market around it, start with house value.

Frequently asked questions

Is freehold better than leasehold?

Neither tenure is better in every case; it depends on the property and on the lease. Freehold avoids ground rent, landlord consent and an expiry date, while a leasehold flat is often the only realistic way to own part of a building where the structure, roof and shared areas belong to someone else.

Does leasehold affect a mortgage?

Yes, a lender will look at the lease and at how much of the term is left, and the point at which that becomes a problem varies between lenders. Ask your lender and the solicitor handling the purchase rather than relying on a general rule.

Can I sell a leasehold home without extending the lease?

Yes, you can sell with the remaining term as it stands, and the buyer takes on the lease as it is. Some buyers will ask you to extend first or to adjust the price, and government guidance sets out the formal route if you decide to extend.

Whichever tenure you own, the sale turns on the documents behind it, so check the title first and the local sold prices second.