The leasehold services team
The leasehold services team is here to provide our leaseholders and shared owners with access to a range of leasehold services, from lease enquiries to conveyancing queries and requests to make home improvements.
Our aim as a team is to provide you with an excellent, efficient, tailor-made and customer-friendly leasehold service.
You can contact your leasehold adviser on 01903 703 102, or via our Customer Experience Team on 01903 703 100, or by email.
We will acknowledge all enquiries or requests within five working days, and if we are unable to resolve your query in that time – depending on the nature of your enquiry – we will provide you with an agreed timescale.
We also invite you to join our Facebook group.
General leasehold information
New leaseholders
Firstly, welcome to Worthing Homes – we have a designated team here for all your leasehold needs.
Where there has been a resale of a leasehold property, we should receive a notice of transfer from the solicitors informing us of the new leaseholder.
As a new leaseholder please provide us with your contact details as we may need to contact you from time to time regarding any work coming up, or any matters regarding the neighbourhood or block in which you live in. If your contact details change at any time please let us know.
Your lease
Your lease is a legal agreement between you and the person who owns the freehold of the property/building. It is important that you have a copy of your lease, as it explains both parties’ rights and responsibilities. Please familiarise yourself with your lease, if you haven’t done so already.
If you don’t have a copy of your lease you may be able to obtain a copy from your lender or land registry, or you can purchase a copy from Worthing Homes (subject to availability) – view our menu of leasehold services and charges for more information.
Your key responsibilities
As a leaseholder, you must:
- adhere to all the terms, conditions and covenants set out in your lease;
- pay your ground rent and service charges; and
- maintain and carry out repairs to your home, keeping it in good order.
Menu of leasehold services and charges
We regularly have to carry out additional work when a leaseholder, shared owner, or freeholder has a particular need or requirement and there are administrative costs in providing these services.
Services include providing information to solicitors to help with leasehold property sales, requests for lease extensions, variations, granting permission for alterations and issuing compliance certificates.
View our menu of leasehold services and charges
Subletting
If you want to sublet your home, it is important that you check the terms of your lease first. If your lease states that you are allowed to sublet, you will need to make contact with our Leasehold Adviser, and complete the leaseholder subletting request form providing us with:
- your correspondence address (your home address);
- your up-to-date contact details;
- your tenant’s / letting agent’s name and contact details;
- confirmation that they have the Right to Rent;
- a copy of the tenancy agreement; and
- a copy of consent/permission from your mortgage company to sublet.
Please look at our menu of leasehold services and charges for the cost of this service.
If you are a shared owner, you will not be eligible to sublet your property. Your lease will normally say that you cannot sublet or part with possession (allow someone else to occupy) part or whole of the property.
More information
For more information, please see the following:
Buildings insurance
We provide the buildings insurance for the majority of our leasehold and shared owner properties (shared owners which have not staircased to 100% freehold). We can provide a copy of the insurance documents upon request, should you need this for reference or if you need to make a claim.
Buildings insurance does not provide cover for the belongings in your home. We advise that you take out your own home contents insurance.
Where to get advice
We understand that there may be times where you want to seek some independent advice, so here are some useful links and contacts:
How are we doing?
Our aim is to provide you with a good quality service. We can only be sure that we are succeeding and meeting your expectations if you let us know. Whether you are sharing a great customer experience, reporting an issue or concern, or giving us suggestions, we will always be pleased to hear from you.