This policy review is now closed.

The Homeownership Policy is a crucial document that impacts all our freeholders, leaseholders and shared owners.

Update: Final review published - 31st October

Our vision is to ensure a safe, comfortable, and affordable home for every household. This policy outlines settle’s responsibilities toward service charge-paying freeholders, leaseholders, and shared owners to ensure a consistent management approach across these tenure types.

🔍Here's what we found:

• The feedback focused not on the Homeownership Policy itself, but on ways to improve the pre 2021 Shared Ownership model.

🎯Here's what we've done:

In April 2021 the Government introduced a new version of Shared Ownership for the 2021-2026 Affordable Homes Programme. This introduced the following changes to the existing shared ownership scheme:

• Reduced the initial share that can be purchased from 25% to 10%,
• Introduced the option of staircasing in 1% increments for the first 15 years based on a valuation we’ll provide to you every April; larger shares can still be purchased with the minimum reducing from 10% to 5%
• Introduced a 10 year period during which the costs of certain maintenance or repairs will be met by Settle rather than the shared owner (known as The Initial Repair Period).
• The option for shared owners to end the nomination period at the 4 week point if they wish to pursue a sale on the open market rather than the previous eight week period.

These improvements were built into the new Shared Ownership Model lease (2021-26) which we implemented from 2022 onwards.

*Please note that the above changes are not retrospective and only apply to homes sold with the 2021-26 Shared Ownership Lease.*

Please refer to you lease for more details in the first instance or email the Home Ownership Team on homeownershipteam@settlegroup.org.uk

You can read more about the changes we've made in the updated policy here, or you can find out more about the new version of the Shared Ownership Model on the Capital Funding Guide here.

Update: 27th August

Thank you for all the feedback on our Homeownership policy! Your input is invaluable, and we are currently reviewing your suggestions.

Our vision is to ensure a safe, comfortable, and affordable home for every household. This policy outlines Settle’s responsibilities toward service charge-paying freeholders, leaseholders, and shared owners to ensure a consistent management approach across these tenure types.