Shared ownership - maximum of 80% & no rent charge?

chick21

I'm looking at a property in London at the moment, it's a 2-bed flat with an FMV of £380,000. I'm not quite sure how it's been valued this high, as almost all the other flats in the property on Zoopla range from £170-250k. Although these could all be 1-beds.

However it is available as a 45% Share for £171,000 with ZERO rent and a monthly service charge £140.72 pcm (is this reasonable?) I still don't quite understand how zero rent is charged on the other 55%.

There is an option to purchase/staircase up to a maximum of 80% of the property. Is there any reason why this is a bad/good thing?

Just wondering if anyone here has been through the same process or has any views on the above information?

carefullycautious

This sounds more like shared equity where you own 100 percent of the property but the builder has a second charge on the mortgage. Look up shared equity on Google and you will seen what I mean. It is different to shared ownership.

Fire_Fox

Ignore Zoopla valuations, there have been many threads on this and they seem to pluck a number from thin air: look at land registry sold prices for similar properties in the area.

Blacksheep1979

so 80% would be in the 280-290k range which is more than what you believe 100% of the property is available for elsewhere - that may answer your question of why there is no rent...

theartfullodger

I still don't quite understand how zero rent is charged on the other 55%.

Old saying: If it sounds too good to be true then it isn't...

It's got to be some sort of con/smoke-n-mirrors fiddle... and probably the only way to find out the "real" price would be to get someone else to go along wanting to but 100% cash... no mortgage ..

You're gonna pay for the "rent" somehow, somewhere...

Cheers!

Lodger

chick21

From Land Registry, I can only see one other flat in the building being sold for £365k in Jan 2005, one at £245k in Oct 2008 with the rest at around £100-180k.

I would also need to be registered on the local council's shared ownership waiting list.

BexInLondon

Bear in mind that if it's Shared Ownership your market is reduced when it comes to selling. Yet another reason to be very, very sure that the price is reasonable. Where in London is this? 380 sounds very high for a 2-bed SO! Ours (also in London) is 3-bed, 3-bath and 3-balcony and we paid 380 in March 09.

chick21

BexInLondon wrote: »

Bear in mind that if it's Shared Ownership your market is reduced when it comes to selling. Yet another reason to be very, very sure that the price is reasonable. Where in London is this? 380 sounds very high for a 2-bed SO! Ours (also in London) is 3-bed, 3-bath and 3-balcony and we paid 380 in March 09.

In Battersea, across from Chelsea along the river (but no river views).