Your rights

As a leaseholder you have certain rights and responsibilities that can differ from owning your property outright. When you purchase a flat or maisonette you are buying the right to occupy part of a larger building for a specific length of time. All leases granted by Newcastle City Council are for a lease term of 125 years from when the lease was first granted. The length of the lease reduces over time from the date when it was originally granted. Some of your rights as a leaseholder are described below:

• Right of occupation and quiet enjoyment of the flat

As long as you comply with the terms of the lease you will have the right to occupy the property and have the right to quiet enjoyment of your home. If you need further advice on this issue you should consult a solicitor or other suitably qualified independent professional on the meaning of ‘quiet enjoyment’.

• Right to use shared areas of the buildings and grounds

Your lease will define your rights to use the shared parts of the building. It will also define your right to have your flat benefit from the structural parts of the block in which it is situated.

• Right to sell your flat

As the leasehold owner of the flat, you will have the right to sell it. However, this right is subject to a number of stipulations:

• If you sell the flat within a certain period after you have bought it from the Council, you will be required to pay some, or all of the Right to Buy discount back to the Council. For more information about this please contact us.    

Your responsibilities

As a leaseholder, you effectively become a ‘shareholder’ in the block you live in. This means you have a responsibility to pay your share of the costs of managing and maintaining your block. Your landlord (the council) has a legal duty to charge you your share of the costs, and you have a legal duty to pay them.

The lease sets out various restrictions for you, your family, your visitors and anyone else who lives in your home on how you and they live in and use your home. These are similar to the conditions in a tenancy agreement for our tenants, and are there to make sure that no actions of the residents cause a nuisance to others or cause damage to the building. 

You must:

• keep your home in good repair and condition
• not to do anything, or allow anyone else in your household or your guests to do anything, which might cause damage, be a nuisance or disturbance to any of the other residents in your building, or any neighbouring buildings
• not make any structural alterations or additions unless you have got our permission, in writing, first
• allow us into your home to carry out repairs to your flat or other parts of the building, or to neighbouring properties, if we give you 48 hours notice in writing (except in emergencies)
• take responsibility for any overflows and for the cost of any damage caused
• not put up a TV aerial or satellite dish outside your home or on the building
• not use your home for running a business.

Our responsibilities

We own and are responsible for the main structure of the building, the shared parts and any shared services to your building or estate. These will depend on where you live and the type of property in which you live, but may include:

• outside walls
• inside structural walls
• roofs, foundations, timbers, joist beams, chimney stacks, gutters, rainwater and soil pipes
• window frames
• lifts
• door entry systems
• concierge schemes
• caretaking
• grounds maintenance
• estate lighting
• block lighting (entrance halls, stairways etc)
• maintaining estate roads and paths.