Rent, service charges and buyback for shared ownership… This month, we take a look at the long-term cost of shared ownership, including how rent can increase over time and why getting clear answers about service charges matters.
We also share news about our forthcoming Shared Ownership Insights: Buyback report, share a trailer for a shared ownership video – “Know before you buy” – and update you on our work to make the Shared Ownership Resources website more accessible.
Read on for a roundup of the latest shared ownership news and our activities in August.
How much could your shared ownership rent increase?
Rent calculator
How affordable will your shared ownership rent be in five, ten or even 25 years?
Our new shared ownership rent calculator is now live, allowing shared owners and prospective buyers to explore how rent could change over the longer term.
Shared ownership rent is generally reviewed annually according to a formula set out in the lease. Depending on the lease, this may be inflation plus an additional 0.5%, 1% or 2%.
Our calculator allows you to enter your current monthly rent and the rent-review percentage specified in your lease. You can then see what could happen over 25 years using average inflation rates of between 1% and 6%, or explore five illustrative scenarios in which inflation changes from year to year.
Unfortunately, these scenarios aren’t forecasts. But they can help demonstrate something that can easily be overlooked when buying a shared ownership home: affordability in the first year isn’t necessarily the same thing as affordability over the longer term.
Homes England’s Key Information Documents: Rent
Homes England is also placing greater emphasis on future costs. Its latest Key Information Documents include an illustration of how shared ownership rent could increase over five years, while current guidance says the rent used in affordability assessments should be “stress tested” over a five-year period.
We welcome this increased focus on ongoing housing costs.
Back in 2022, our report to Homes England on its Key Information Documents criticised what we described as a “year-one” approach to affordability. We recommended giving prospective shared owners more information about future rent increases and long-term affordability.
Understanding future costs matters because relatively small annual increases can compound over many years.
Of course, rent is only one element of the cost of a shared ownership home. Shared owners may also need to budget for
- mortgage payments,
- service charges,
- estate service charges,
- repairs and maintenance, and
- other costs depending on their property and lease.
Our calculator is intended as an educational tool rather than a prediction of future inflation or an individual affordability assessment. Always check the Rent Schedule in your own lease for the formula that applies to your home.
Know before you buy
We’ve collaborated with TWIG_UK on a shared ownership video. (Click on the image below for the trailer. The link will take you to our new Instagram account).
Why can it be so difficult to get answers about service charges?
Unsurprisingly, service charges are one of the biggest concerns for those exploring shared ownership.
In our latest My SO Home shared ownership review, Olivia Virag explains how a straightforward question about service charges eventually led to formal complaints, requests for accounts and invoices, a Housing Ombudsman case and an application to the First-tier Tribunal.
Olivia says she found incorrect calculations and details of the property, incomplete records, missing invoices and unsupported charges while trying to understand the service charges relating to her home. Her experience involved more than 250 emails and an evidence bundle running to more than 800 pages.
She writes:
“A straightforward question about where the money went should always receive a straightforward, properly evidenced answer.”
Olivia still believes shared ownership can provide a valuable route to a home for people who might otherwise be unable to afford one. But she argues that affordability shouldn’t stop when someone receives the keys to their home.
Since 2020, she says her rent has risen by 38.4%, while her service charge has fluctuated considerably. She would like to see:
- stronger ongoing affordability protections,
- standardised year-by-year service charge statements,
- access to supporting invoices, and
- a meaningful voice for shared owners in the services commissioned on their behalf.
Challenging service charges
Her experience raises an important question: what does a legal right to challenge charges mean in practice if exercising that right requires considerable time, confidence, evidence and potentially significant legal expense?
Clear information and transparent accounting shouldn’t require years of persistence from residents. Shared owners should be able to understand what they are being charged for, how the figures have been calculated and whether the services they are paying for have actually been delivered.
Launching our SO Insights: buyback report
Our new Shared Ownership Insights: Buyback report will launch at the Housing Community Summit in Liverpool on 9 September 2026.
Shared Ownership Resources founder Sue Phillips will be speaking at the session, Shared ownership: building trust and delivering value for customers, alongside Stuart Hensby of Abri and Ann Santry CBE of the New Homes Quality Board. The session takes place from 12.15pm to 12.55pm.
Our report has been co-written by Sue Phillips (founder, Shared Ownership Resources), Michael D’Ambra (trustee, Shared Ownership Resources), Kevin Edwards (Partner at Geoffrey Leaver Solicitors and a member of our Professional Advisory Panel), and Jamie Ratcliff (housing consultant and co-founder of Place Base).
The report brings together research, professional insights and the experiences of shared owners who have sought buyback.
Buyback is where a housing provider purchases a shared owner’s share in their home. It can offer an important exit route where a property cannot be sold. But there is no general legal right to buyback and access remains extremely limited. Housing providers are not required to operate a buyback policy.
Where can I get the report?
The SO Insights: buyback report will be available to download from the Shared Ownership Resources website in September.
In the meantime, shared owners can use our SO Hub guide to housing providers’ buyback policies to find out whether their landlord has published a policy and what it says.
Are you actively seeking buyback, or has your housing provider turned down a request?
We’d like to hear from you. We have a WhatsApp group providing peer support and information for people navigating buyback, and we’re always looking for shared owners willing to share their experiences. This might be through our My SO Home series of shared ownership reviews or by speaking to journalists researching shared ownership.
Real-life experiences help us understand how policies work in practice – and where change may be needed.
Shared ownership: homes, hopes and hard questions
Shared Ownership Resources founder, Sue Phillips, recently joined Dr Mahmoud Alsaeed of the Cambridge Centre for Housing & Planning Research and Harry Cheong, Senior Policy and Insights Manager at Places for People, for a wide-ranging discussion about shared ownership.
The Cambridge Housing Voice conversation explored affordability, staircasing, exit routes, responsibility across the housing sector and the importance of listening to shared owners’ lived experience.
One issue discussed was the relationship between staircasing and resale.
Buying additional shares can reduce the rent paid to a housing provider. But partial staircasing can sometimes make a home harder to sell if a higher share becomes unaffordable to eligible shared ownership purchasers.
The conversation also explored buyback. Sue argued that exit routes shouldn’t be considered only when somebody is already facing extreme financial distress. People may need to move for many reasons, including changes in family circumstances, work or because their current home is no longer suitable.
The full conversation is available online, together with an open-access transcript.
You can find out more about John, our trustees and the professionals who support our work on the Our People page.
Making Shared Ownership Resources more accessible
Clear information isn’t useful if people can’t access it.
We recently asked AbilityNet to review the Shared Ownership Resources website against WCAG 2.2 digital accessibility standards.
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines are designed to make online content more accessible to people with a wide range of disabilities and access requirements.
We’ve now started implementing AbilityNet’s recommendations across the website and hope to complete this work during September.
Accessibility is particularly important to us as an organisation focused on information and consumer empowerment. Shared owners should be able to access our resources regardless of how they browse the web or the assistive technologies they use.
We’ll provide a further update once the work is complete.
Creating our new Shared Ownership Guide
We’re continuing work on our new Shared Ownership Guide, drawing on feedback from shared owners about the information people need before buying – and the questions that can arise after moving in.
In our July roundup, we shared some of the findings from our survey of shared owners. Respondents highlighted issues including long-term affordability, rent increases, service charges, major works, staircasing, resale, lease terms, administration charges and the risk of becoming trapped in a home that is difficult to sell.
Our aim is to create a practical resource grounded in the experiences and questions of shared owners themselves, helping prospective buyers understand not only the initial purchase price but also the longer-term financial and practical implications of shared ownership.
The draft content is now out with a team of shared owner reviewers. We’ll share more information as the guide develops.
Stay up to date on shared ownership
In short, August has brought many of the issues around long-term shared ownership affordability into focus.
Our new rent calculator demonstrates how annual rent increases can accumulate over time. Olivia Virag’s experience highlights the importance of clear, evidenced service charges. And our forthcoming Shared Ownership Insights: Buyback report will examine what happens when shared owners need a route out but selling their home proves difficult.
At the same time, we’re continuing work on our new Shared Ownership Guide, improving the accessibility of our website and strengthening our organisation with the appointment of our new Chair.
We’ll continue to gather evidence from shared owners and housing professionals, provide independent information and campaign for greater fairness, transparency and affordability in shared ownership.
To keep up to date, simply join our mailing list for updates, journo requests and/or fundraising appeals.
Featured image: Shutterstock
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