How Many Commonhold Properties Are There in the UK?

Commonhold property ownership is an established concept in UK law which offers several advantages to owners of property in relation to current leasehold arrangements. Despite its benefits, it remains significantly underutilized, with fewer than 20 registered commonhold developments currently in the UK.

That number deserves a moment. Commonhold has been on the statute book since the Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002. In more than two decades it has produced fewer than twenty developments — over the same period, England’s leasehold stock has grown to nearly five million homes. As practitioners who help leaseholders take control of their buildings every week, our position is blunt: commonhold is the better legal design and, today, usually the impractical choice. Until mainstream lenders publish commonhold lending policies, collective enfranchisement remains the route that actually completes. This article gives you the real numbers, the reasons behind them, and what we tell clients who ask.

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How Many Commonhold Properties Are There in the UK?

Fewer than 20 commonhold developments currently exist in the UK, according to the most recent data. This translates to less than 200 individual commonhold units in total across England and Wales, based on figures from the government published Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government 2024 Commonhold White Paper.

By contrast, in 2023-24, there were an estimated4.83 million leasehold dwellings in England. The majority of leasehold properties are flats which are sold as a package with a new house. This equates to 19% of the English housing stock, highlighting the enormous disparity between policy aspirations for commonhold expansion and its real-world uptake.

Put those two figures side by side and the ratio is roughly one commonhold unit for every 24,000 leasehold homes. Whatever commonhold’s merits — and they are real — that is not a market failing at the margins. It is a tenure that, twenty years in, the market has declined to adopt.

Commonhold is nonetheless firmly back in the spotlight. The Law Commission published detailed reform recommendations, and the Government’s 2024 White Paper proposes making commonhold the default tenure for new flats. The proposed changes target three things: simplifying the process for owners to move to commonhold ownership, updating the management rules, and strengthening the rights of commonhold unit owners. Substantial change in both law and lending practice is what it will take for commonhold to become a competitive option for owners and developers.

Why Is Commonhold Ownership So Rare?

In theory commonhold has a lot to offer but in practice there are a number of barriers to its adoption, this paper aims to identify and examine the reasons why the commonhold product is so rarely found in the UK property market.

Key barriers to UK commonhold properties include:

• Lender Reluctance: Mortgage lenders have historically been hesitant to finance commonhold units, viewing them as a higher risk due to their unfamiliarity.
• Developer Preferences: Developers often favor the leasehold model, which allows them to maintain an ongoing income stream through ground rents, service charge, and fees. Of importance also are the developer’s costs in relation to the freehold and any mechanisms they may have for exiting the lease.
• Legal Complexity: The legal framework for commonhold is perceived as complex, with insufficient infrastructure to support seamless transactions. This results in disputes and difficulties in management for owner occupiers.
• Awareness Issues: Both public and professionals, including solicitors and estate agents, often lack awareness or experience with commonhold. The perceived or actual cost of the recurring service charge in leasehold properties can be a major barrier to purchase for owner occupiers. The recurring service charge in leasehold property can also be a financial barrier for owner occupiers.
• Optional Adoption: Commonhold is not a mandatory requirement, even for new developments, which means developers often opt for the more traditional leasehold system, a legacy of the feudal system of property ownership.

Commonhold has failed to gain traction since it was introduced as a leasehold alternative in 2002. Reform of the current system could be greatly benefited by making it easier to convert a leasehold property into a commonhold (including where there are multiple interested parties).

The Barrier We See Most: Lenders

Of those five barriers, one dwarfs the rest in our experience — and we learned it doing something else entirely. When we helped the leaseholders of Garden Lodge Court buy their freehold at auction, Phase 3 of the job was standardising a drawer of mismatched, error-ridden leases. The benchmark we drafted every new 999-year lease against was CML compliance — lender requirements — because a lease a mainstream mortgage lender won’t lend on is, commercially speaking, a defective lease, whatever a lawyer thinks of it. A flat you cannot mortgage is a flat you cannot sell.

That is commonhold’s entire problem in one sentence. With fewer than 200 units in existence, most lenders have no commonhold precedent, no standard valuation approach and no published policy — so each application is an exception, and exceptions get declined. Developers know this, which is why they don’t build commonhold; buyers’ solicitors know it, which is why they advise caution; and so the precedent base never grows. It is a chicken-and-egg lock that only legislation plus lender commitment can break. This is why we tell clients the honest version: the question that matters is not “how many commonhold properties are there?” but “who will lend on mine?”

What’s Being Done to Encourage More Commonhold Properties?

There are currently initiatives and proposals in place to encourage the use of commonhold as a form of land ownership. Initiatives and proposals are also working towards promoting and implementing the concept to its full potential in order to enable it to deliver its promised benefits. It offers hereditaments that are perpetual, no ground rent to pay and most importantly for leasehold flat owners, a far greater degree of control over the property.

• Law Commission Proposals: In 2020, the law commission published a series of proposals designed to reform and revitalize the commonhold system. The proposals are intended to simplify the current regime, to facilitate the conversion of existing leasehold properties to common ownership, and to help the existing (long leaseline) leaseholders of properties which are already held under leases.
• Future Legislation: The government published a draft leasehold and commonhold reform bill, which is expected to introduce significant changes to leasehold law. The legislation is intended to prohibit the sale of new leasehold flats, making commonhold the default — though existing leaseholders will still need their own route out.
• Government Support and Consultation: Ongoing consultations aim to gather feedback from stakeholders, with the government expressing support for making commonhold a more viable option. The proposals are being received positively with commonhold potentially becoming a more viable alternative.
• Political Will: While commonhold is frequently mentioned in discussions about leasehold reform, concrete actions remain pending. Although there has been an interest in this recently, little has been done to move matters forward. Commonhold is sometimes confusingly labelled as a condomanian model, popular in the US and Australia, but the proposals on the desk in England relate to a far more traditional model whereby owners have responsibility for their part of the building, usually through freehold ownership.

In multi occupation buildings the commonhold association is responsible for the running of the premises. On a freehold basis owners of commonhold units have ownership of the width of the building allocated to the unit but are also responsible with other owners for the parts of the premises that are shared with others. Owners may find it difficult to come to a view as to what should be done with shared areas and equally difficult to enforce any decision that is made; this problem being particular acute in larger premises. In some retirement schemes there are age limits and the commonhold approach can provide a suitable structure and flexibility for these schemes.

Will Commonhold Ever Replace Leasehold?

It is increasingly asked whether or not commonhold will replace leasehold. That is not such a straightforward question.

• Technical Possibility: With the right reforms, commonhold could technically replace leasehold. The leaseholder does have the right to eventually purchase the freehold of the property or to convert the leasehold to a commonhold or freehold. Although there is technically the potential for leasehold to be replaced by commonhold or freehold, it is unlikely to happen anytime soon due to deeply entrenched and inflexible interests and structures within the sector.
• New-Build Feasibility: Commonhold is more feasible for new-build developments, where the legal framework can be integrated from the outset, rather than retrofitting existing leasehold properties.
• Industry Shift Requirement: For commonhold to become mainstream, a significant shift in industry practices and legal support is necessary. The reforms need to work in practice for larger properties that are held as freehold leases and need to be converted to common ownership. There is a current lack of understanding about commonhold and the commonhold characteristics.
• Growing Support: There is a growing movement among campaigners, leaseholders, and reform groups advocating for commonhold as a fairer system. While a victory is far from certain there is clearly growing support which in time should translate to both policy changes and mainstream adoption as the superior method of residential property ownership.

Our honest answer: not for existing blocks, and not soon. Conversion under the current law effectively requires unanimity, and the lending problem above sits on top. What we tell leaseholders who love the idea of commonhold is this — the practical first step is the same either way: take ownership of your building through collective enfranchisement. Once you and your neighbours own the freehold, grant yourselves 999-year leases at a peppercorn, and you have secured almost everything commonhold promises — perpetual security, no ground rent, full control — with mortgages that every lender understands. And you will be perfectly positioned to convert to commonhold if and when the reformed regime makes it sensible. That is precisely how our Commonhold Association Service is designed: freehold first, commonhold when the law catches up.

Route to control	What you get today	Track record
Commonhold conversion	Perpetual unit ownership, no lease at all — but unanimity is required and mortgageability is unresolved	Fewer than 20 developments nationwide since 2002
Collective enfranchisement (buy your freehold)	You own the building with your neighbours; 999-year leases at peppercorn ground rent; full management control	Long-established and lender-friendly — e.g. our Lancaster Court group settled a £7.9m counter-notice at £2m; Bridge Court joined 22 of 24 flats
Right to Manage	Management control without buying the freehold — a faster, cheaper first step	Well-trodden statutory route; does not remove the freeholder’s ownership

While uncommon,Commonhold Association is possible with the right guidance.Contact us to learn more.

A Comparative Look at Commonhold vs Leasehold

So just to clarify the differences between commonhold and leasehold in a handy table……

Feature	Commonhold	Leasehold
Ownership	Owners have full freehold ownership of their plot but also share ownership of the common land.	Leaseholders own the right to occupy, not the property itself.
Duration	Perpetual ownership.	Leasehold property has a limited time period, the lease, and this can vary between a few years and 125 years.
Ground Rent	No ground rent payable.	Ground rent is often required.
Management / Financial Obligations	These are managed by the owners of the houses in the development themselves and are usually free of any service charge payable to a freeholder.	These charges are set and collected by the freeholder or building managing agents, and owners are responsible for paying a proportion of the service charge.
Conversion	Complex but possible from leasehold.	Not applicable.

Summary and Key Takeaways

Although commonhold has potential, there is currently a large difference between what it could offer and the limited take up that there is to date. With fewer than 200 commonhold units having transferred into common ownership compared to millions of leasehold homes, it is important to identify the barriers to take up and explore options for overcoming these.

• Current Adoption: Fewer than 20 commonhold developments exist, encompassing fewer than 200 units across England and Wales.
• Barriers to Adoption: Mortgage lenders’ reluctance to finance due to perceived risks, developers’ preference for leasehold due to ongoing income, complex legal framework and lack of awareness among stakeholders.
• Efforts to Promote Commonhold: The Law Commission’s 2020 proposals to simplify legal processes and conversion, and the government’s plan to make commonhold the default tenure for new flats and break the ‘ground rent trap’.
• Future Prospects: Technical feasibility for new-builds, requirement for industry-wide shifts in practices and legal frameworks, and increasing advocacy and support from reform groups.
• Our practitioner’s takeaway: Don’t wait for commonhold. Buy your freehold with your neighbours now, take the 999-year peppercorn leases, and keep the commonhold option open for the day the lenders arrive. indicate commitment to promoting commonhold as a viable alternative to leasehold.

Whether or not commonhold becomes the leasehold alternative is a matter of some significance. For the property owner, commonhold is an alternative to leasehold, providing perpetual ownership of a property rather than a lease which expires. Of course, leasehold reforms are what many interested in this alternative will be reading about in this article.

Our Commonhold Association Service is designed for leaseholders who want to take full control of their property, empowering them to manage both their individual flats and shared spaces through a unified ownership model. Under this service we assist leaseholders in taking ownership and control of their property whilst also allowing them to manage their property as well as the communal areas under a common model of property ownership.

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See also: book a free consultation with the team, or browse our cases to see how leaseholders like you took control of their buildings.