Leasehold grows to 4.1 million flats, says Government

The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) has developed a new methodology for estimating the number of residential properties that are privately owned on long leasehold, in the owner occupied and private rented sectors.

The estimate does not include flats in the social rented sector (homes owned by a social landlord and rented out to social tenants).

According to the DCLG’s estimates, there are 2.4 million owner occupied properties, while there are 1.7 million privately owned homes that are let and 8.2 million people overall living in flats. Considering an average occupancy of two people per unit, this means there are about 3.4 million tenants in the private rented sector.

However, because 500,000 leasehold homes are unoccupied at any time, the actual number of rental properties with tenants would be somewhere between 1.2 million and 1.7 million.

The total leasehold figure previously used by the department was 2.5 million households, in 2011/12, with 1.4 million in the owner occupied sector and 1.1 million in the private rented sector.

However the new methodology takes into account a number of factors, including the number of households in each apartment, vacant homes, the higher proportion of flats in the private rented sector and the number of leaseholders who own a share of the freehold.