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ARTICLE · 28 MARCH 2025

Commonhold – Is It Really Around The Corner?

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The advent of commonhold has been much trumpeted. The government has just published a new white paper, The proposed new commonhold model for homeownership...

United StatesReal Estate and Construction
Gillian Palmer
Gillian Palmer
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Background

The advent of commonhold has been much trumpeted. The government has just published a new white paper, The proposed new commonhold model for homeownership in England and Wales. After so many years, could commonhold be the new reality for future residential and mixed-use developments?

Historically, take up of this alternative structure to leasehold has been unenthusiastic – there are twenty-nine registered commonholds in total, despite the Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002 promising a new era in land ownership.

Lender caution may have been one factor for commonhold tenure being unpopular, but so also was the "one size fits all" approach to commonhold of the first report by the Law Commission in 1987. A more recent Law Commission Report in 2020, Reinvigorating Commonhold: The Alternative to Leasehold Ownership signalled a more practical and nuanced approach to commonhold, and it is the recommendations contained in this report that the Government

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