Types of application to the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber)
Varying leases
These rights are set out in Sections 35 to 40 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987.
Your lease is a contract between you and your landlord. No matter how unsatisfactory the conditions of your lease may seem, you cannot vary its conditions without your landlord’s permission.
In some cases, unsatisfactory conditions in a lease may affect all the leaseholders in a building, or varying one lease may affect the other leases. In these cases, it is often difficult to get every leaseholder to give their permission to vary the lease, so the law allows the tribunal to make an order to vary all the leases in the same way without the need for leaseholders’ permission.
Varying single leases (flats)
For long leases of a single flat, you, your landlord and any management company named on the lease can apply to the tribunal for it to be varied on the grounds that the conditions in the lease that relate to the following are not satisfactory.
- Repairing and maintaining the flat or the building, or land or buildings that are let to the leaseholders or which the leaseholders have rights over.
- Insuring the building the flat is in, or the land or building let to you under the lease.
- Repairing and maintaining installations (whether in the building or not) which are necessary to provide a reasonable standard of accommodation.
- Providing or maintaining services to provide a reasonable standard of accommodation, for example, lighting, cleaning, caretaking and insurance.
- Calculating the proportion of the service charge that each flat should pay in relation to the whole building, if the individual proportions add up to more or less than 100%.
- Paying interest on service charge arrears.
- Recovering money from one person which someone else has spent for their benefit (or the benefit of others, including them).
If an individual leaseholder makes an application to change the lease for one flat, anyone else named on the lease can apply to the tribunal for the variation order to also apply to one or more other leases.
Varying two or more leases (flats)
An application can also be made for an order to vary two or more leases in the building in the same way to correct the same problem with the leases. The leaseholder or the landlord can make this application. If the application concerns fewer than nine leases, all (or all but one) of the people concerned must give their permission for the application. If the application concerns more than eight leases, no more than 10% of the people concerned must oppose it, and at least 75% of them must give their permission for it. For these purposes, the landlord is one of the people concerned.
Leaseholders and the landlord can make an application to vary two or more leases if the change they are hoping to achieve cannot be satisfactorily achieved unless all the leases are varied in the same way.
The tribunal may make an order to vary the leases in line with the application or as they consider appropriate. They may also make an order instructing the people concerned to vary the leases in line with their instruction, and the tribunal can order anyone concerned to pay compensation to anyone likely to be disadvantaged by the change in the leases. However, they cannot make an order if changing the leases would cause a disadvantage to another leaseholder which could not be helped by paying compensation.
If you want to apply to vary two or more leases, you must serve notice of the application on anyone likely to be affected by the proposed variation. This will include your landlord, the other leaseholders (if the change will affect them) and the other leaseholders’ mortgage providers. If you do not serve the notices, anyone who should have received one can apply to the tribunal to cancel or alter the variation or, in some cases, to bring action for damages.
Varying leases (houses)
The above guidance relates only to flats, but landlords and leaseholders can also apply to vary the lease of a house if the conditions relating to insuring the building or recovering the costs of the insurance are not satisfactory.
In summary, you and your landlord can apply to the tribunal to do the following.
- vary the lease of a flat (section 35)
- make the same change to the leases of other flats in the building (section 36)
- vary two or more flat leases (section 37)
- in limited circumstances, cancel or alter a variation the tribunal have ordered to a flat lease (section 39 (3b))
- vary the lease of a house if the conditions relating to insurance are not satisfactory (section 40)
Application Form – Application for the Variation of a Lease or Leases
- Last updated:
- 11 May 2025
- Next review:
- 18 December 2026