What is transferred in the sale
An apartment in a cooperative building is owned by the housing cooperative, not by you. What you hold is a cooperative share — membership rights and obligations, which include the right to use the apartment. In a sale, it is this share that you transfer to the buyer.
In practice this means that nothing is registered in the Land Registry. The cooperative remains the owner of the building; only the identity of its member changes.
The contract and the cooperative
The transfer is made by a contract for the transfer of a cooperative share. It takes effect towards the cooperative when you deliver the contract to it, or a notice of the transfer signed by both parties. Before signing, it pays to go through the cooperative's articles — they may set out, for example, how the transfer is to be notified.
Also find out whether the apartment carries any debt to the cooperative or an unpaid part of a loan the cooperative took out for the building. The buyer will ask, and a clear answer speeds up the sale.
How the buyer pays for the apartment
A buyer of a cooperative apartment usually cannot get a standard mortgage secured by the apartment being bought — it does not belong to them, so they cannot pledge it to the bank. They solve it in other ways: security on another property, a building-savings loan or their own savings. Take financing into account from the start, because it affects the range of potential buyers.
When the cooperative transfers apartments into private ownership
Some cooperatives gradually transfer apartments into their members' ownership. If your building is preparing to do so, it may make sense to wait with the sale, or alternatively to sell the share together with information about the planned transfer. The decision depends on how far along the cooperative is.
How we help
We have experience with selling and transferring cooperative shares, as well as with the subsequent sale of an apartment once it is in private ownership. We handle communication with the housing cooperative, the contract and all the paperwork around the transfer.
