Leasehold reform in England and Wales: What’s happening and when?
Constituency casework
Published Wednesday, 21 May, 2025
Home ownership
Housing and planning
Hannah Cromar
Find out about the implementation of the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 and further proposed reforms.
Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024
The Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act (LFRA) 2024 received Royal Assent on 24 May 2024. The remaining parliamentary stages of the bill were fast-tracked in the wash-up period before the 2024 general election.
The act applies to England and Wales. It implements commitments in the Conservative government’s 2017 housing white paper to “improve consumer choice and fairness in leasehold.”
It also takes forward many of the leasehold reform recommendations made by the Law Commission in their reports of 2020.
The LFRA 2024 will strengthen leaseholders’ rights.
It will:
make it cheaper and easier for leaseholders in houses and flats to extend their lease or buy their freehold, including by removing the requirement to pay marriage value.
increase the standard lease extension term to 990 years, with ground rent reduced to a peppercorn (zero financial value), upon payment of a premium.
change the qualifying criteria to give more leaseholders the right to extend their lease, buy their freehold and take over management of their building.
ban the granting of new leasehold houses (with some exceptions).
improve the transparency of:
service charges and give leaseholders a new right to request information about service charges and the management of their building.
administration charges and buildings insurance commissions.
remove the presumption that leaseholders pay their landlord’s legal costs when challenging poor practice and give them a new right to apply to claim their legal costs from their landlord.
extend access to redress schemes for leaseholders where the freeholder manages the property directly.
ensure that relevant property sales information is provided to leaseholders in a timely manner.
The act will also strengthen the rights of freehold homeowners on private and mixed-tenure estates.
The Library’s constituency casework page on Freehold estate management provides further information about these measures.
The explanatory notes to the LFRA 2024 provide further information on its provisions.
The act follows on from the Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Act 2022, which put an end to ground rents for most new residential leasehold properties in England and Wales.
When will leaseholders benefit?
Although the LFRA 2024 has received Royal Assent, the majority of the provisions are not yet in force. Many will require further consultation and secondary legislation to be commenced.
The Labour government has committed to implement the act “as quickly as possible”, whilst recognising “the significant complexity of the task and the importance of taking the necessary time to ensure that reforms are watertight.”
The Housing Minister, Matthew Pennycook, set out the government’s intended sequencing for bringing the act’s provisions into force in a written statement to Parliament on 21 November 2024. He also reported that a small number of specific but serious flaws had been identified in the act which would need to be rectified via primary legislation.
To date the government has:
consulted on proposals to increase the transparency of buildings insurance fees charged to leaseholders. The consultation closed on 24 February 2025 and the government is analysing the feedback.
laid regulations to permit leaseholders to extend their lease or buy their freehold without having to wait for two years after purchasing their property. The regulations came into force on 31 January 2025.
laid regulations to implement the act’s Right to Manage (RTM) provisions. This includes changing the qualifying criteria to give more leaseholders the RTM and removing the requirement for leaseholders to cover the freeholder’s legal fees when making an RTM claim. The regulations came into force on 3 March 2025.
The LFRA 2024 sets the method for calculating the cost of a statutory lease extension or freehold acquisition. Marriage value will no longer form part of the calculations. The government expects to consult in summer 2025 on the rates to be used in the calculations. The rates will then need to be set out in secondary legislation.
The Leasehold Advisory Service (LEASE) has published information for leaseholders who are considering extending their lease: Should I wait to extend my lease? I have heard that planned changes could make lease extension cheaper.
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