Shared Ownership

Our shared ownership scheme is know as The HOLD Project.

The HOLD Project

Helping People with disabilities to own their own homes

Our HOLD project is a Shared Ownership scheme delivered in partnership with Newlon Housing Trust. The scheme enables people who meet the eligibility criteria to own their own homes. Housing Associations can access funding that allows people with Learning Disabilities to buy their own homes through a shared ownership scheme. It works by allowing an applicant to buy part of a property, while the Housing Association owns the other part.

A grant from The Housing Corporation enables Newlon Housing Trust to provide this scheme in partnership with us. At the moment properties located in The London Boroughs of Hackney, Newham, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Redbridge, Havering, Barking and Dagenham and the City of London are eligible.

To be eligible for Shared Ownership you should:

Be receiving Income Support, Incapacity Benefit or other related benefits for 39 weeks
Have, or be eligible for, a support package from Care Management
Be looking to move to a property that better meets your needs as a person with a disability

With Shared Ownership, you own part of a property and pay rent on the rest, it sounds expensive - almost like you are paying twice, but that’s not the case. In most situations benefits pay the entire cost of both rent and mortgage. Here’s how it works:

Putting you in control

The scheme allows people with disabilities to choose where they want to live and the type of property they want to live in. It also provides greater security in the home as being a leaseholder and not a tenant means any decision to move on is the homeowners, not a landlords.

Looking for your home

Once you have found the property you want through an estate agent, Newlon Housing Trust buy it and sell a share to you – usually between 30-75%. Your share will be sold to you at the same time as the property is bought - so it doesn’t take any longer than purchasing a home in the normal way. Newlon will also take responsibility for repairs to your home, simply because you are paying rent on part of it!

Paying the mortgage

For people with disabilities or support needs a benefit called Income Support Mortgage Interest (ISMI.) ISMI helps you to pay the mortgage costs - although do remember that ISMI will only pay the interest payable on your mortgage. The maximum mortgage upon which ISMI can be paid is £100,000. To qualify for ISMI the part of the property that is owned by the Housing Association must be rented to you, and your rent and service charges be eligible for housing benefit.

This means that, subject to eligibility, someone with a disability can own their own home - with the mortgage and rent costs being paid by their benefits – clever isn’t it?

Selling your home

The mortgage would be an ‘interest only mortgage’ which means that the capital is only paid when the property is sold. If the value of the property goes down the deficit would be met by the Housing Association, but if the value goes up you will receive a proportion of the increase

For more information contact:

Sonia Lyng - Shared Ownership Project Manager