Help Centre

You will need a minimum investment equal to 5% of the Property Purchase Cost subject to an absolute minimum of £10,000. There is no maximum.

CrowdToLive® don’t have a minimum household income per se, however, the rental of your property should not exceed 40% of your annual income.

We’ll need to know:

• How much money you have for a deposit (minimum £10,000)

• Sole or Joint Application

• Your annual and household income

• Your credit report

• If you’ve been declared bankrupt or defaulted payments

We may also ask you for some additional information depending on your personal circumstances.

It is important to note that when calculating your annual salary and household income, we do not include any government benefits received.

CrowdToLive® will not consider benefit income to assess affordability. However, if the client receives benefit income now or later, and this is used to help pay the rent, that is not a problem.

No. Mortgages are debt based financial products, which is usually reflected on your credit record. With CrowdToLive® , you’re not borrowing money. Instead, your home is partially owned by you and the remainder by the CrowdToLive® community of investors.

Unlike a mortgage, you are not obligated to repay the full cost (plus interest) of the property over a period of time.

You will however be required to pay rent to the investors, on the share that you don’t own.

No, the CrowdToLive® product allows you to remain debt free.

Unlike the shared ownership schemes, if you choose to sell your home, your property can be sold in the normal way on the open market, without restrictions some of the shared ownership schemes have. Restriction examples:

• No ‘right to first refusal'. Generally shared ownership providers have first refusal to try to sell your house before you are permitted to market your house on the open market. Their pool of suitable investors is usually limited and as such this often results in a delay to your sale process.

• No additional restrictions on your buyer. A number of shared ownership providers will only sell your property to individuals who meet their strict eligibility criteria, which is in addition to the usual criteria placed on buyers from their mortgage lender. To make matters worse, there are a limited number of mortgage lenders willing to loan on shared ownership properties.

• Limited Shared Ownership Stock. There are currently only a small number of shared ownership properties available to purchase in the property market. However, with the CrowdToLive® product you are able to apply with most properties currently listed for sale in the open market.

• Leasehold. Most Shared ownership properties whether a house or a flat are leasehold. The CrowdToLive® scheme gives you the option of purchasing a freehold property on the open market.

• Subletting. Subletting is usually not allowed under the terms of a Shared Ownership lease. CrowdToLive® does not allow subletting under any circumstances. This is based on the provision that you are responsible for the rent. This activity is prohibited.

• Suitability. We acknowledge that in some cases Shared Ownership might be a better fit than the CrowdToLive® scheme.

CrowdToLive® are a team of professionals that believe in offering alternative solutions to conventional debt financing; they continue to build innovative solutions and challenge the status quo. They are owned by Elite Capital and Management Services Limited.

Elite Capital and Management Services Limited is a UK based company, that owns and operates the CrowdToLive® Scheme.

Elite Capital and Management Services Limited are regulated in the UK by the Financial Conduct Authority (Reference Number: 822039).

Unfortunately, these things cost a lot of money to get right and CrowdToLive® can't just make this publicly available. However, if a scholar contacts us on behalf of an organisation, the contracts may be be shared directly with the scholars if it's to check shariah-compliance in an official capacity under a non-disclosure agreement.

In any case, all customers would receive a copy of their contract through the solicitor.

We will review all freehold properties where the Purchase Cost is below £500,000, however, we look at several factors but not limited to:

• Location

• Type of property

• Purchase Cost

Yes. This is your home so you can paint the walls, change the carpet and put up your favourite pictures! CrowdToLive® call these aesthetic changes.

For any more substantial alterations that will impact the value of the property, such as extension, loft conversion... you would need to seek the prior approval of your other investors.

No, CrowdToLive® will take care of that for you.

The house will be purchased in your name and a company name, therefore the offer will need to be made by CrowdToLive® .

No, this is up to you. You just need to have a minimum of 5% of the Purchase Cost subject to a minimum of £10,000.

CrowdToLive® works out your home-buying budget using information like your household income and the amount you’ve saved for a deposit. Where a bank uses this information to work out how much to let you borrow, CrowdToLive® uses it to work out how much you can afford to pay in rent. This could mean that you can afford a nicer home in an area you actually want to live in.

Investors that are looking to invest in the UK property market. Most of the CrowdToLive® investors are looking for an alternative to the conventional buy to let market.

You would own the property, as well as the Company (investors will purchase shares in a Company that will co-own the property with you). Both names would be entered in the Land Registry and the percentage of ownership recorded.

Once you have provided all the documents and details of the property you wish to buy, approval can be obtained within a few days (a week); then CrowdToLive® will arrange a home buyers' report (£600), this might take a couple of weeks. If this satisfactory also, you're good to go! CrowdToLive® will begin obtaining the funding form investors whilst the solicitors start preparing the documents.

Registering and sharing your property project with CrowdToLive® is totally free. Once you have selected your home and the seller has accepted the company offer, we will require you to send your deposit to CrowdToLive®. They will also ask you to pay for a house survey to ensure that the property does not have any major defects and that the selling price is within market value.

It is important to note that the cost of the house survey is non-refundable.

A property Champion (you), is required to pay the following costs...

Prior to purchase:

• Property survey fee

• Electrical Installation condition report

• Gas safety fee

At the point of purchase:

• Property purchase cost (This is proportionate to your ownership)

• CrowdToLive® fee (you will only pay this once the property purchase is complete, you will pay a fee of 3% of the funds you invested).

Property purchase cost example:

If the property purchase cost is £200,000 and you purchase 10% of the property, the cost you will pay is £20,000

Platform fee example:

If you invest £20,000, In this example, the fee you pay us will be £600 (20,000 x 3%).

The property Purchase Cost (“Purchase Cost”) involves:

• Property price

• Legal fees

• Stamp duty

Yes, annually you will pay:

• Service Charge (which will include your Building insurance, Boiler and Home emergency cover)

• Annual Gas safety fee

The service charge incorporates Building insurance, Boiler and Home emergency cover, which protects against things that go wrong.

For example, if your kitchen floods because you left the taps running. You are living in the property so, it’s fair to make this your responsibility.

As you will live in the property, you will be responsible for the maintenance.

You split this cost with the other investors, according to how much of the home you own. For example, if you buy 5% of the home, you only pay 5% of the Stamp Duty.

Stamp Duty is a tax paid to the government every time a home is bought. It’s worked out as a percentage of the home’s value.

Unfortunately not. Because you’re buying a home with our investors via a Limited Liability Company, the government charges a higher tax rate. All purchases will be charged the additional rate of 3%.

However, you only pay Stamp Duty in proportion to your ownership so you will most likely end up paying a lot less than if you were buying outright yourself. For example, if you start with 5% ownership, you only pay 5% of the Stamp Duty.

No. The client would only pay a percentage of the stamp duty equivalent to their initial share of the property; when purchasing more shares they will not have to pay any additional stamp duty fees. This means that the champion will only pay a small percentage of the stamp duty cost - they might not get the same benefits as a first time buyer going with a bank but the cost of stamp duty is relatively low.

The champion would not be paying two sets off stamp duty either in case you are wondering; they would only pay a percentage of that initial cost. After the current SDLT holiday due to covid-19 comes to an end, this will be especially attractive for clients looking to purchase above £300k.

No; except for land registry fee to remove the company as a partner from that property and transfer it all in your name.

CrowdToLive® works out your rent by looking at similar homes in the same area. This is the normal way to determine rent for any home.

As a rough guide, we expect properties in London to have a market rental value of 5% of the value of the property, 5.5% outside of London. CrowdToLive® will use market values based on Zoopla figures initially to give indicative price.

Remember, you only pay rent on the amount of the home you don’t yet own.

Example: If you own 5% of a home and the rent is £1,000 per month, you only pay 95% of the rent. In this example, your rent will be £950 per month.

If you do not pay your rent it is likely that you will be evicted and your home will be sold. Once the property is sold, deductions will be made from your share of the property before any capital is returned back to you, if any.

If at any point you believe that you will be unable to meet your rental payments, we urge you to contact us as soon as possible.

Yes, this product was built to enable you to live in the property as your main residence. Therefore, this product is not meant for buy to let projects.

Yes. Once a year your rent will go up at the rate of CPI (Consumer Price Index) + 0.5% per annum.

Example: Let's say the rent in your first year is £1,000 per month. CPI (Consumer Price Index) is 1%+ 0.5%, then the rent in your second year would be £1,015 per month.

Yes, your rent can go down when you purchase more of your home.

The product is part owned and part rented. You pay rent on the part you don’t yet own.

Although you don’t immediately own 100% of the home, you can treat it as your own and some of the benefits are:

• You are a co-owner of the property

• You pay a discounted rent

• You have more rights than a tenant

• You can increase your ownership every 3 months

As a co-owner you are fully responsible for the maintenance and repairs required to the property.

Yes. Every three months you will be given the option (it not an obligation!), to purchase an additional share of your property. The amount you purchase is up to you, however, the minimum amount that can be purchased is £5,000.

The only limitation is, CrowdToLive® would not oblige the investors to sell their shares if they are in negative equity (selling their shares at a lower price then they bought them for).

All you need to do is complete a simple form which CrowdToLive® will provide you with and they will process. You will be charged a 1% admin fee of the amount you purchase i.e. if you purchase £5,000, then you will pay us an admin fee of £50.

The purchase price is calculated as follows:

sum which is A + B:

Where:- A is the higher of:

(a) the Initial Purchase Value; and

(b) the sum determined by multiplying the Initial Purchase Value by the index value of the House Price Index (HPI) for the month that falls two months before the month of the Exercise Date, then dividing the product by the index value of the HPI for the month that falls two months before the date of this Deed (“HPI Purchase Value”); and

B is 1% of the Initial Purchase Value for each completed year from the date of this Deed until the Exercise Date (up to a maximum of 10% of the Initial Purchase Value).

No, there is no limit on how much you can buy every year.

Yes, you will need to provide us with 3 month’s notice to increase your ownership.

No, the absolute minimum value of shares you can buy is £5,000. If you have less than this, you can just wait another 3 months to see if you have reached a saving of £5,000 and buy the further shares at a later date.

Yes, this is what we want for you too! Just bear in mind, you will pay 1% of whatever share you buy.

No. There is no lock-in period and you can buy the property out whenever you wish. In fact, this is better for us so we can use the funds to invest in another property.

No. There are no penalties for buying out early; you will only pay 1% of the value of the shares for CrowdToLive® fee.

Forever as long as the investors are happy to keep their shares in the property or new ones can be found at renewal (every 5 years). There is no obligation for you to buy any further shares for as long as the investors are happy to keep their money in. If CrowdToLive® cannot find any investors, then the same applies as per the answer below: Can anyone tell me to leave my home?

No. As long as you are not expecting the investors to buy you out a price lower than than they paid for it, you won't be refused when you want to acquire more shares.

No. When you first sign up, you will be granted a 5 year lease on the property. The agreement between you and the Investing partner means that nobody can tell you to leave as long as you are paying rent each month on time and not breaching the contract. We want you to feel safe and secure.

It is important to note that on each 4th year of your lease agreement, you will be offered the opportunity to renew the lease agreement for a further 5 years (at the end of the current term). If you do not want to renew said lease then the property will be marketed for sale.

If you decide that you would like to renew the said lease, the Investing partner will be offered the opportunity to agree to a 5 year renewal (at the end of the current term).

In the event that the majority of the Investing partner (51%) decides that they do not wish to renew the lease then you will be offered the opportunity to purchase the remainder of the property you do not own. You may want to do this using alternatives modes of finance.

If you decide not to purchase the remainder of the property you do not own, then you do not need to worry, the Investing partners share of the property will be offered to other Investors.

In the case that there is no other willing investment party to purchase the remainder of the property you do not own, and you do not wish to buy either, then the property will be marketed for sale and each party will get their share of the sale proceeds.

The property will be sold, however, you will still be responsible for the property rental until the property is sold. The good news is, you will retain your full share of teh market value on sale (minus the cost of selling as described below).

If you decide that you want to sell the property before the expiry of the 5 year lease agreement, we ask you to pay for the property valuation which normally costs about £350.

You will also be solely responsible for other sale associated costs i.e. Legal Estate agent fee’s (this is because you’re initiating the end of the partnership).

For example, if the property is sold for £300,000 and the Estate agent’s and Legal fees cost £5,000, and you own 10% of the Property (which normally equate to £30,000), you would receive £25,000.

There are five main ones

1. Void Period - this is every landlord’s constant worry, the so-called ‘void period’ when, following a tenancy termination, the property is unlet for an indefinite time. With CrowdToLive®, that uncertainty is lessened because every tenant signs a five-year lease.

2. CrowdToLive® sidestep the bulk of estate agency fees. Tenant-finding fees, inventory fees, property management fees all add to the landlord’s expense ratio.
   In recent years, moreover, changes to the law have made it increasingly difficult for agents to charge fees to tenants, leaving landlords to carry that additional burden.
   With CrowdToLive®, in contrast, the investment property comes fully-let for a minimum of five years.
   Besides, our management fee is only 2% of the rent, compared with estate agents’ typical 12% levy.

3. A key attraction for CrowdToLive® professional investors: most expenses are insured and insurance premium are paid by the Champion. Any landlord’s nightmare is a tenant who stops paying rent while mortgage payments continue. CrowdToLive® is different. CrowdToLive® is an all-equity platform, so the property is debt-free: no mortgage, no lender lien of any kind, no interest payments – hence, the attractions of our service for Muslims.

4. Moreover, Champions pledge their equity against unpaid rent and fees arising from any breach of the tenancy agreement. If we can’t resolve that breach with the tenant within an agreed period, we’ll start an eviction process. Once the property is vacated, we will sell it and the proceeds of the Champion’s equity will go to pay any outstanding rent and fees. This limits the cash-flow risk of unpaid rent.

5. Finally, there is the long-standing problem that property is an investment with a very high barrier to entry, given the average cost of £251,500 according to the UK House Price Index for end-December 2020. That compares with a minimum investment of just £40,000 on the CrowdToLive® platform.

CrowdToLive properties are located all around England. However, our main current focus is on the larger cities, where the available selection of properties is wider and there’s good liquidity if we need to sell.

Champions have the option, but not the obligation, to buy more equity in their property every three months, with the percentage movement in the UK House Price Index as the basis for valuation. That provides the exit path for our professional investors.

Investors can also sell their equity at any time but they will first need to find a buyer – for which, however, there’s no guarantee. After five years, the property will be sold if the Champion does not want to renew a tenant’s five-year lease or if a majority of the professional investors want to sell the property.

CrowdToLive targets a rental yield of 5% to 6% annually, net of expenses. It is worth noting that Champions and professional investors also share any potential capital gain when the property is sold.

As with any investment, there can be no return at all unless some risks are taken. First of all, the value of the property could go down.

Secondly, there is a liquidity risk because willing buyers may prove hard to find when it’s time to sell.

Due to those risks, the product is only available to Sophisticated and High Net Worth Individuals.

However, the key to minimising such risks is diversification. No-one should invest all of their savings in property alone. It should be just one element in a balanced portfolio of complementary assets.

Taking that one step further, CrowdToLive® could actually help to reduce the risks of property investing because its low minimum investment may enable buyers to hold a diverse range of properties (houses, flats, new-builds, conversions, etc) in different locations.

As with all property purchases it is important to know that investing in property involves risks, including loss of capital and illiquidity.
 This is not an exhaustive list of risks and you should read the full risk warning alongside the FAQ’s (please read the full risk warning here).

This product is not protected under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS).

This product offered is not a mortgage, hence, you have none of the protections of MCOB 13.

For further information on what MCOB 13 is, please click here to review the Financial Conduct Authority definition.

Providing great customer service is important to us and as such we do everything we can to prevent complaints occurring. However, we do appreciate that despite our best attempts, sometimes things might go wrong.

If you are unhappy with any aspect of the service we have provided then please email us at info@CrowdToLive.com or call us on +44 203 542 1452 to tell us how we can help.

What you’ll need to tell us so that we can help you:

• Your personal details

• What’s gone wrong and

• What you want us to do to put things right

We’ll be in touch with you as soon as we can and let you know what will happen next. We’ll try to resolve your complaint within 3 working days of receipt – if we’re unable to do this we will write to you acknowledging that we have received your complaint and the next steps that will be taken. For more complex issues it’s likely that we will need longer to look into what’s happened and we may ask you for further information to help us reach an outcome.

If we are unable to resolve your complaint, then UK Residents can ask the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) to carry out an independent review of your complaint.

You have the right to ask the FOS to review your complaint if we’ve been unable to resolve it within 8 weeks.

If you are unsure whether the FOS will consider your complaint, please contact them directly for advice. The service the FOS provides is free and impartial and contacting them at any stage of your complaint will not affect your legal rights.

The contact details for the FOS are:

The Financial Ombudsman Service

South Quay Plaza

183 Marsh Wall

London

E14 9SR

Telephone Number: +44 (0)300 123 9123 or +44 (0)800 023 4567.

Email: complaint.info@financial-ombudsman.org.uk