Keeping you safe: building owner’s responsibilities for shared ownership properties

The building owner must carry out a fire risk assessment regularly to make sure your building meets fire safety rules. Most housing associations do an assessment every year.

They need to check:

• external wall systems (cladding, insulation, balconies)
• common parts of the building such as an entrance hall, landing or stairwells
• flat entrances

What the building owner must do if there’s a fire safety risk

If the fire assessment finds a serious fire risk, the building owner must:

• act on the fire risk assessment
• remove or replace dangerous materials, for example, cladding
• fix fire safety issues (for example, missing fire breaks such as concrete walls that help prevent fire spreading)
• put measures in place to make the building safe if building works cannot be done immediately (for example, 24-hour patrols checking for fire)
• start work on making sure the building is no longer a fire risk

A building owner or housing association cannot charge you for the cost of removing unsafe cladding if:

• your building is 11 metres high or more (or 5 storeys, including the ground floor)
• it was your main home on or after 14 February 2022
• you owned no more than 3 UK residential properties

If the property was not your main home on 14 February 2022, you’re still protected if you had to move out and sublet.

When you sell your home, protection from these costs transfers to the new owner.

Limits on costs the housing association can pass on 

For building defects other than cladding, on buildings 11 metres high or more, there are limits on the amount you can be charged. You will not need to pay more than:

• £10,000 outside Greater London
• £15,000 in Greater London

Building owners must pay for anything above these amounts, including the cost of fire safety measures put in place before the work is complete.

The amount you pay depends on your share of the property.

You do not need to pay anything if on 14 February 2022 the value of your property was less than:

• £175,000 outside Greater London
• £325,000 in Greater London

Check the value of your property on 14 February 2022 by searching HM Land Registry sold prices.

Find out more about the leaseholder protections

If your building is less than 11 metres high

For a building less than 11 metres high the building owner or housing association can only charge you “reasonable” costs for:

• replacing cladding
• putting fire-safety measures in place on your home while they replace cladding

The government has said that if your building is less than 11 metres high, it’s unlikely you will need new cladding to make the building safe. If the building owner wants to change the cladding, you should contact the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government and they will check if it’s needed.

Your landlord can charge for fire doors or other fire safety measures to stop fire spreading if allowed by your lease.

Find out more: paying historic fire safety costs: buildings under 11 metres or 5 storeys (England)