If you own a leasehold flat in Northumberland, "the end of leasehold" doesn't mean your lease disappears or converts overnight. The government's plan is to stop new leasehold flats being created and make commonhold the default going forward — it isn't a plan to automatically rewrite the lease you already hold above the high street in Alnwick, in a converted townhouse in Hexham or Berwick, or in one of the blocks along the coast at Amble or Blyth. Reform is real and moving, but it treats existing leaseholders very differently from future buyers. Here's what actually applies to you right now, and what's still just a proposal.
Your lease doesn't convert to commonhold automatically
The ban on new leasehold flats, and commonhold becoming the default tenure, is aimed at what gets built and sold from now on — not at flats already sold on a lease. Under the draft Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Bill published in January 2026, existing leaseholders keep their current rights and obligations exactly as they are; there is no requirement for an existing building to convert to commonhold. What the Bill does propose is making conversion easier if leaseholders in your building want it — lowering the proportion of owners who need to agree from 100% down to 50%. That's a choice your building could eventually make together, not something imposed on you.
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Get a conveyancing quoteWhat's already law and already helps you
Two changes from the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 are genuinely in force today. Since 31 January 2025, you no longer have to own your flat for two years before you can extend the lease or start buying a share of the freehold — that right applies from the day you complete, which matters if you've bought more recently or are about to. And since March 2025, Right to Manage has got easier to use: leaseholders taking over management of the building no longer have to cover the freeholder's legal costs, and the non-residential floorspace limit that can block a claim rose from 25% to 50%, bringing more buildings with ground-floor shops into scope.
Nothing about your existing lease changes on its own — every real benefit so far has to be actively used, not waited for.
What's proposed but not law yet — including the ground rent cap
The part that gets the most attention is the ground rent cap: £250 a year, falling to a peppercorn (effectively zero) after 40 years, announced by the government on 27 January 2026 as part of the same draft Bill. Unlike the leasehold ban, this is intended to apply to existing leases, not just new ones — but it is still a proposal. The draft Bill went through pre-legislative scrutiny, and the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee's report on 27 May 2026 said the government's approach was a step forward but needed to "go further and faster." A further consultation on exemptions for certain older "quid pro quo" leases closes on 27 August 2026. Current estimates put the cap coming into force around late 2028, subject to it passing Parliament. Abolishing "marriage value" — a cost that inflates lease extension prices once a lease drops under about 80 years — is written into the 2024 Act too, but the valuation rates that would replace it still haven't been settled, so it isn't something you can rely on today either.
What this means if you're staying put
If you're not planning to sell, the practical takeaway is to use what's already real rather than wait for what isn't. If your lease is dropping towards 80 years, you can start an extension the day you decide to — you don't need to wait two years, and waiting for marriage value abolition could cost you more than acting now if the timeline slips again, which it has done more than once already. If your building has enough non-residential space to have previously been blocked from Right to Manage, it's worth checking again, since the threshold has doubled.
What this means if you're thinking about selling
Buyers and their solicitors are increasingly reform-aware, so be ready to answer the same questions clearly: how long is left on the lease, is the ground rent already a peppercorn or a fixed modest sum, and are two years of service charge accounts available rather than a rough estimate. Don't let a buyer assume the ground rent cap or marriage value changes already apply when pricing — they don't, and there's still no fixed date. A well-documented lease with a recent extension or a low, capped ground rent will always show better than one leaning on reforms that haven't landed.
