Does anyone have any advice for my 'different' shared ownership query?

[louloulouise]

I don't even know if this is possible but here goes - any advice will be welcome.

A friend of the family has approached us with an offer of her selling us her shared ownership property (which I believe is thru a HA). She has been told the lowest she can sell her 25% at is £25k.

Here's where there could possibly be a problem - the house is in an area we would have next to no chance of being able to afford with property prices in this area consistently too high for us and not showing much fluctuation in the market. It is also the area in which DH and I grew up and friend knows we have been desperate to move to this area ever since we moved to where we are now.

We currently own our own home about 3 miles away from this friend's property and it is not a good area, but we have max £38k equity but possibly less depending on the market.

Could the friend choose to sell to us or would the HA have a say? We aren't particularly high earners (£25k pa combined) so I'm not sure whether this would be a problem or not?

Someone from the HA is supposed to be ringing back so I can enquire re this but no call as yet.

Any advice/info would be gratefully received!

Hi Loulou

I live in a SO property so altho have not actually sold one I think I understand how it normally works!

I believe that should you choose to sell, firstly the property must be valued - usually via 3 estate agents to get a balanced view I think. The vendor and the HA would then agree which EA to go with. the property must normally be marketed for a period of time, and buyers must meet HA criteria (normally subject to maximum income levels etc). Anyone making an offer would have to 'apply' to the HA and be checked out by them. The HA then get to choose the best candidate.

This is because HAs exist to help those unable to buy via normal channels.

I don't know whether you would qualify or not in the first place but say you didn't, then I believe your friend would be able to push the HA to agree to sell to you IF no suitable candidates had been found after a certain period.

All this info should be in the T&Cs your friend should have been issued when they bought. Each HA has different terms and processes so what I am saying may not be quite right in your friend's case but should give you a vague idea. HTH.

Wishing you lots of luck and fingers crossed it will pan out for you!

If you are thinking of buying a shared ownership property it's not just the mortgage you have to think about. There will be rent and on top of that service charge.

If its a flat the service charge will be hefty and although you pay rent you pay for your share of all the repairs through the service charge.

Thanks for the advice/info it's been really helpful. My friend has found out she is able to sell to us, no restrictions being placed by HA and the rent for the remaining 75% of the prop is a very reasonable £130. So all being well we should be able to go ahead and start looking into mortgage/selling our house etc.