National statistics

Social housing sales and demolitions 2020-21: Right to Buy sales

Updated 27 January 2022

Applies to England

1. Headline figures

From April 1980 to March 2021:

1,992,799 social housing dwellings were sold through the Right to Buy schemes

^{[footnote 1]}

91% of all social housing sales were through Right to Buy schemes

In 2020-21 there were 9,319 sales of social housing through the Right to Buy schemes, a decrease of 39% compared to 2019-20

In 2020-21 there were 777 sales of social housing through the Right to Acquire scheme, a decrease of 31% compared to 2019-20

2. Right to Buy sales

The data on Right to Buy presented in this release is complemented by the “Right to Buy sales and replacements in 2021-22” statistical release which will be released in June/July 2022 and will focus on the receipts from the sale of local authority properties and how they are spent on the provision of new social housing. For more information, please see the technical notes.

In 2020-21, there were 9,319 sales of social housing through the Right to Buy scheme, including Preserved Right to Buy and Voluntary Right to Buy ^{[footnote 2]}, a decrease of 39% compared to 2019-20. Of these, 6,994 were local authority owned and 2,325 were owned by private registered providers. Of those owned by PRPs, 2,187 were sold through the Preserved Right to Buy and 138 were sold through the Voluntary Right to Buy.^{[footnote 3]}

Since the introduction of Right to Buy in 1980-81, there have been 1,992,799 sales of social housing to tenants through all the Right to Buy schemes. The vast majority, 94%, of the sales has been to local authority tenants. However since 2010-11, 27% of all Right to Buy sales have been to tenants of PRP owned social housing.

Figure 2.1 Sales to tenants through the Right to Buy Schemes, England; by provider, proportion of sales 1996-97 to 2020-21

In 1982-83 when the scheme first started, 167,123 dwellings were sold through the Right to Buy, representing 3% of social housing stock at 31 December 1981. There have been various smaller peaks and troughs since then, reflecting various changes in policy relating to the Right to Buy. In 1986, the rules changed to allow for higher discounts to tenants of flats and the minimum term for tenants to purchase their property was reduced from 5 years to 2 years. This led to a second peak in sales between 1988-89 and 1989-90 where over 130,000 dwellings (over 2.7% of stock) were sold each year.

Figure 2.2 Sales to tenants through Right to Buy schemes per 1,000 stock, by provider 1980-81 to 2020-21

In 1999, the maximum discount was reduced from £50,000 to a regionalized maximum, ranging from £22,000 in the North East to £38,000 in London. This change was followed by an announcement that Right to Buy was due to be reduced which led to a sharp uptake from 1998 to 2004. Total Right to Buy sales in 2003-04 were 84,102, the highest since 1989-90. In 2003, the rules were changed which increased the minimum tenancy to 5 years to qualify for Right to Buy and decreased the discounts. This change, along with the global financial crisis, meant that between 2003-04 and 2010-11, annual sales through Right to Buy dropped from 84,102 to 3,144, a 96% reduction.

In April 2012, the government changed the maximum cash discount available for Right to Buy sales to a new higher level of £75,000 across England. In March 2013, in recognition of the increasing property prices in London, the government further increased the maximum discount available for tenants living in London boroughs to £100,000. In July 2014, government changed the maximum cash discount available for the Right to Buy in order for it to increase annually in line with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rate of inflation. The discount was £84,600 in England and £112,800 in London in 2020-21. This reinvigoration, along with the introduction of the Voluntary Right to Buy, increased sales through Right to Buy to 18,100 in 2016-17; more than a 5-fold increase compared to 2010-11, but still less than 22% of the level in 2003-04.

Since 2016-17, annual sales of social housing through the Right to Buy schemes have been gradually declining, from 18,100 in 2016-17 to 15,288 in 2019-20. There was a sharper decline in 2020-21 which may be, in part, due to the restrictions introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Sales of local authority properties through Right to Buy in 2020-21 declined by 34% compared to 2019-20, while sales of PRP-owned stock through Voluntary Right to Buy and Preserved Right to Buy reduced by 50% in the same time period.

Figure 2.3 Sales to tenants through Right to Buy schemes per 1,000 stock, by provider 2003-04 to 2020-21

3. Right to Buy sales by region

Preserved Right to Buy and Voluntary Right to Buy data are not available by region. The data collected by the RSH records the total number of sales to tenants by local authority. As Preserved and Voluntary Right to Buy comprise over 77% of total sales to tenants of PRP owned properties, sales to tenants will be used interchangeably in this section to describe trends of Right to Buy sales regionally

The figure below shows the total number of sales to tenants by region between 1980 and 2021. As can be seen, during the first 4 years of the Right to Buy scheme, the most sales were seen in the North West and West Midlands. When the scheme was changed to increase the discounts for flat sales, the number of sales in London and the South East increased the most, reaching a higher peak in sales than when the scheme first began. Until 2011 all Right to Buy sales recorded by region are only local authority sales; from 2011-12 onwards PRP sales are also included in the total.

Figure 2.4 Sales to tenants through Right to Buy schemes, by English Region 1980-81 to 2020-21

From 1986 to 2015 there were multiple large scale volume transfers (LSVTs) ^{[footnote 4]} of LA stock to private registered providers. LSVTs were more prevalent in certain regions of the country, particularly in the North West where 85% of stock was owned by PRPs by 2015. Because of this, in the 5 years to 2020-21, 77% of sales to tenants in the North West were PRP stock, whereas in Yorkshire and the Humber, where there were fewer LSVTs, the sales were predominantly (83%) LA owned stock.

Figure 2.5 Sales to tenants through Right to Buy schemes, by English Region and Provider 2011-12 to 2020-21

Since the reinvigoration of the Right to Buy scheme in 2012, sales to sitting tenants increased in all regions of England, but the largest increase was seen in London. In 2014-15, 0.6% of London’s social housing stock was sold to tenants.

In 2020-21 the percentage of stock sold to tenants was similar across all regions, ranging from 0.12% in North West, to 0.37% in East Midlands.

Figure 2.6 Sales to tenants through Right to Buy schemes per 1,000 stock, by English Region 2009-10 to 2020-21

4. Right to Buy discounts

Financial data on Right to Buy discounts is available back to 1998-99 for local authorities and private registered providers. Between 1998-99 and 2011-12, the average discount reduced from 50% for both LAs and PRPs to 27% and 30% respectively. Following the reinvigoration of the Right to Buy scheme, which also impacted Preserved Right to Buy, the average discount increased to 45% and 50% in 2012-13 for LAs and PRPs respectively. Between 2012-13 and 2020-21 the percentage discount has remained broadly consistent and is now 43% for LAs and 54% for PRPs.

Despite the percentage discount for PRP sales remaining higher than discounts for LA sales, the value of the discount for LA properties was higher than that for PRP properties. This is due in part to the fact that most LA Right to Buy sales are on properties in the South East and London, where property values are higher. In 2020-21, the average property price sold through Right to Buy was £160,160 for LAs and £135,920 for PRPs. In 2020-21, there was an increase in the average property price sold through Right to Buy, reflecting the wider housing market, which in turn led to a higher average discount. Compared to 2019-20, discounts in 2020-21 were up by 5% and 17% for LAs and PRPs respectively.

5. Right to Buy applications

Data on applications of tenants to buy their social housing through the Right to Buy scheme is only collected by local authorities and currently is only available by local authority since 2011-12. Data on Right to Buy applications is not available for private registered providers.

In 2020-21 there were 24,333 applications by local authority tenants to purchase their social housing property through the Right to Buy, a decrease of 7% compared to 2019-20 and the lowest number of applications since 2011-12. The number of sales in a given year is typically half the number of applications.

Figure 2.7 Local authority Right to Buy applications and sales, England 1998-99 to 2020-21

6. Details of local authority Right to Buy properties

Since data on bedroom numbers of local authority Right to Buy sales were first collected in 2012-13, 14% of sales were 1 bedroom, 33% were 2 bedroom and 53% were 3 bedroom or more. In this same time period, 5% of PRP sales through Right to Buy were 1 bedroom, 27% were 2 bedroom and 68% were 3 or more bedrooms. These proportions have remained broadly similar across the 9 years.

The chart below shows the breakdown of Right to Buy sales by the number of bedrooms by region for PRP and local authority sales. The graph below shows that for all regions of England, PRPs proportionally sell fewer 1 bed properties and more 3 or more bed properties than LAs.

The chart also shows that for both LA and PRPs, the proportion of 3 or more bedrooms properties sold in London is considerably smaller than for all other regions.

Figure 2.8 Number of bedrooms in properties sold through Right to Buy schemes, by provider and English Region 2012-13 to 2020-21

7. Right to Acquire

Tenants of social housing owned by PRPs who do not have the Preserved Right to Buy may be able to purchase their property through the Right to Acquire. Right to Acquire offers a discount between £9,000 and £16,000 to tenants depending on the location of the property. Since its introduction in 1998, there have been 9,671 sales of social housing through the Right to Acquire recorded by Homes England. ^{[footnote 5]}

In 2020-21, there were 777 sales of social housing through Right to Acquire, a decrease of 31% compared to 2019-20. As can be seen in the chart below, there was a gradual increase in the number of sales from 4 in 1999-00 to 570 in 2006-07. During the global financial crisis, sales fell from 570 in 2006-07 to 86 in 2009-10 before gradually increasing over the next 8 years to reach 791 sales in 2017-18. There was a sharp increase in the number of Right to Acquire sales in 2018-19, when 2,080 sales were recorded, before decreasing over the next 2 years to reach 777 in 2020-21.

Figure 2.9 Right to Acquire Sales in England, 1998-99 to 2020-21

1. Including Statutory Right to Buy, Voluntary Right to Buy and Preserved Right to Buy. ↩

2. Preserved Right to Buy and Voluntary Right to Buy are only available to PRP tenants. More information on these schemes can be found in the technical notes. ↩

3. Data sourced from the Regulator of Social Housing Statistical Data Return (SDR). ↩

4. A Large Scale Voluntary Transfer is the Voluntary transfer of ownership of all or some of a local authority’s tenanted and leasehold homes to a private registered housing provider, registered by the Social Housing Regulator, in return for a payment for the value of that stock. ↩

5. The time series on Right to Acquire sales is derived from data reported to Homes England (HE) and the Greater London authority (GLA). These may differ from the figures from the Statistical Data Return (SDR) due to the coverage, response rates and timing of the SDR returns which are used for Live Table 678. ↩