Selling a House With a Disabled Facilities Grant Charge (2026)

By Lisa Hayes · 11 November 2026

If you had a Disabled Facilities Grant (DFG) of more than £5,000 and you own the home, the council will usually have registered a local land charge against it. Sell within 10 years of the work being certified and the council can ask for the slice of the grant above £5,000 back, capped at £10,000. Can, not must: the council has to weigh four specific personal factors first, and plenty of sellers who ask properly get the demand reduced or waived.

That is the short answer. The longer one matters, because DFG charges tend to surface at the worst possible moment: a week before exchange, in the middle of a probate sale, or when an elderly parent is moving into care and nobody in the family even remembers signing anything. I'm Lisa Hayes, and in this guide I'll walk you through how these charges work, how to work out what you might owe, how to ask for a waiver (with the exact grounds the council must consider), and what happens with other council grants, loans and care charges that can sit on a title in much the same way.

What is a Disabled Facilities Grant charge, in plain English?

A Disabled Facilities Grant is money from your local council to adapt a home for someone with a disability: a stairlift or through-floor lift, a level-access shower, widened doorways, a ramp, a downstairs bathroom extension. In England the mandatory grant can be up to £30,000, and many councils top it up with discretionary funding of their own.

Because it is public money spent on a privately owned asset, the government lets councils attach a string. The rules sit in a fairly obscure document called the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996: Disabled Facilities Grant (Conditions relating to approval or payment of Grant) General Consent 2008. It came into force on 22 May 2008 and applies to local housing authorities in England.

Under paragraph 4 of that consent, the repayment conditions "are local land charges and are binding on any person who is for the time being an owner of the dwelling". In other words, the charge is attached to the property, not just to you personally. That is why it turns up in your buyer's local authority search, and why it can't simply be ignored.

It is not a mortgage, it does not accrue interest under the national consent, and it is not a debt you owe month by month. It is a contingent claim that only bites if you dispose of the home within the 10-year window.

When does the council have the right to ask for the money back?

Three things have to be true when the grant is approved, and two more when you sell. Paragraph 3 of the 2008 consent sets them out:

1. The council approved a DFG.
2. The grant exceeded £5,000.
3. The applicant had a qualifying owner's interest in the property (owners, not tenants).
4. You dispose of the property "whether by sale, assignment, transfer or otherwise" within 10 years of the certified date (the date the council certified the works as finished).
5. Having considered four specific matters, the council is "satisfied that it is reasonable in all the circumstances to require the repayment".

Notice the word "otherwise" in point four. A sale is the obvious trigger, but a transfer to a relative, or a sale by an executor after a death, can count too. Some council pages describe the 10 years as running from when the work was completed and the grant paid rather than the certified date. In practice the dates are usually close, but if you are near the edge of the window, ask the council for the exact date in writing. A few weeks can be the difference between a £10,000 bill and nothing.

How much would I actually have to repay?

The formula is simple. Take the total grant, subtract the first £5,000 (which is never repayable), and cap the result at £10,000. Surrey Heath Borough Council publishes a handy table, and the maths applies wherever the national consent is used:

So the worst case under the national rules is a £10,000 deduction from your sale proceeds. Unpleasant, but rarely the sale-killer people fear.

The catch: discretionary top-ups and council "assistance" can be different

Here's where people get caught out. Many councils fund work above the £30,000 mandatory limit, or offer extra help such as relocation grants, through their own housing assistance policy. Those discretionary sums are not governed by the 2008 consent in the same way. Some councils make them repayable in full on sale, some for a different period, some as a loan rather than a grant. The only way to know is to read the approval letter and conditions you (or your parent) signed, or ask the council's private sector housing team for a copy.

My rule of thumb: if the paperwork mentions "top-up", "discretionary", "loan" or "assistance policy" anywhere, assume the £10,000 cap might not apply to that part until the council confirms otherwise.

Can I get the DFG charge waived? The four grounds the council must consider

Yes, and you should always ask. Paragraph 3(2)(b) of the 2008 consent lists four matters the council has to consider before it decides repayment is reasonable:

1. Financial hardship. The extent to which repaying would cause you hardship.
2. Employment. Whether you are selling to take up a job, or because your place of work has changed.
3. Health and wellbeing. Whether the move is for the physical or mental health or wellbeing of the grant recipient or of a disabled occupant.
4. Care. Whether you are moving to live with, or near, a disabled or infirm person who needs care, or to provide or receive care.

Read those again and think about why most people with a DFG end up selling. The adapted home no longer meets their needs. They are moving into residential care. They are moving in with a son or daughter who will look after them. They are moving to a bungalow because the stairs have become dangerous even with the lift. Ground three or four will often fit squarely, and hardship can sit alongside it.

That is why I get frustrated when families simply pay the demand. The council isn't obliged to waive, but it is obliged to consider, and many councils publish decisions where they have waived the charge. South Cambridgeshire and Mansfield, for example, have both published officer decisions on DFG repayment waivers.

How to write a waiver request that works

Don't send a two-line email saying "please waive the charge". Write a short, factual letter to the council's private sector housing or DFG team that:

• Quotes the grant reference, property address and certified completion date.
• States that you are asking the council to exercise its discretion under paragraph 3(2)(b) of the DFG General Consent 2008 not to demand repayment.
• Takes each of the four matters in turn and explains which apply and why. Be specific: "Mum moved into a nursing home on 3 March because she now needs 24-hour care" beats "for health reasons".
• Attaches evidence: a letter from a GP or social worker, a care home contract, a job offer, or a simple income and outgoings statement if you are claiming hardship.
• Asks for a written decision and the reasons for it.

Send it as early as you can, ideally as soon as you decide to sell, not the week before exchange. Councils don't move at conveyancing speed, and you want the answer before your buyer's solicitor starts asking.

What happens if a parent with a DFG has died? (Executors, read this)

This is the scenario I see most often, and it's the one where families feel most aggrieved. The parent who had the grant has died, the executor sells, and a land charge nobody remembered appears on the search.

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman looked at exactly this in a Cheshire East Council complaint (reference 22 016 530, decided November 2023). An elderly woman received a £10,000 DFG in 2015 for a step lift and a ground-floor bathroom, with a repayment condition attached. She died in 2018, her husband in 2022, and the executor sold the house that year. He paid the council £10,000 in January 2023 and then complained that it shouldn't have been recovered after both parents had died.

The Ombudsman found no fault. The parents had signed the owner's certificate and the approval set out the terms. The executor, as personal representative, stood in the shoes of the grant recipient. And crucially, when the council asked about the four exemption matters, the executor gave no information showing any of them applied. The council hadn't considered discretion further because no appeal or request was made.

Two lessons from that case:

• Death is not an automatic exemption under the national consent. Some councils' own policies treat it more generously, so check, but don't assume.
• Ask before you pay. Once the money has gone, getting it back is a much harder argument. If the death followed a move into care, or the home was sold to fund care, say so and evidence it.

If you're handling a probate sale, my guide to selling inherited property covers the wider process, and this article on what you must disclose when selling a house where someone died is worth a read too.

Will a DFG charge stop me selling or put buyers off?

No. It's one of the least scary entries a buyer's solicitor will see. Here's what actually happens:

1. Your buyer's solicitor orders a local authority search (the LLC1 register search plus CON29 enquiries). The DFG charge shows up on the local land charges register.
2. They raise an enquiry asking whether the charge will be cleared or released on completion.
3. Your solicitor gets a written figure, or a written waiver, from the council.
4. If money is due, your solicitor pays it from your sale proceeds on completion day, alongside your mortgage redemption, and gives an undertaking to do so.
5. The council confirms the charge is discharged and the register is updated.

Buyers rarely care, because the charge is cleared before they own the home. What they do care about is delay. A council that takes six weeks to produce a figure can stall a chain, which is why I keep banging on about writing to them early.

The adaptations themselves are a different question. A through-floor lift, a wet room or a ramp can be a huge selling point to the right buyer and a "we'll need to rip that out" negative to another. Price for the house as it stands, not for what the adaptations cost. If you're unsure where to pitch it, start with an honest look at what your house is really worth.

Does the charge apply if I'm a tenant or in a housing association home?

No. The repayment condition only applies where the applicant had a qualifying owner's interest. Surrey Heath's guidance is explicit that a local land charge "will not be registered" for homes rented from a private landlord or housing association, and Central Bedfordshire's says the same. Tenants still sign a declaration that they'll live there as their main home for the grant condition period (typically five years), but there's no sale-triggered repayment for them.

Landlords are a separate case. If you are a landlord who applied for a DFG for your tenant, your council's conditions will usually require you to keep letting the property for a set period. Breaching that can lead to repayment. If you're selling a let home with adaptations, read your conditions alongside my guide to selling a tenanted property.

Other council charges that work in a similar way

DFGs are the most common, but they aren't the only council or council-backed money that can end up registered against a home. If your search throws up something unfamiliar, it's probably one of these.

Council and Lendology home improvement loans

Lots of councils, particularly in the South West and South of England, deliver repair and improvement loans through Lendology CIC, a not-for-profit lender. South Hams District Council's conditions, for example, describe the security as "a Land Registry Title Restriction and Equitable Mortgages against the property", removed only once the loan has been repaid. Unlike a DFG, there's no discretion to argue: it's a loan, and it gets settled from your proceeds like any other secured debt. Ask Lendology or the council for a redemption statement as early as you would your main mortgage. I've written separately about what to check on a redemption statement, and the same scrutiny applies here.

Care home deferred payment agreements

If a parent's care fees have been deferred against the home, the council will hold a legal charge for the deferred amount, and the agreement will usually include interest and administration charges. This is not discretionary in the way a DFG is: the debt has to be settled, usually when the house sells or from the estate after death. If this is where you are, my guide on whether you have to sell your house to pay for care fees explains the options before you commit to a sale.

How do I find out if there's a charge on my house?

Don't wait for your buyer to find it. Three quick checks:

• Your title register. Download an official copy from HM Land Registry online. Loans secured by a restriction or charge (including Lendology loans and care deferred payments) will usually show in the charges or proprietorship register. If the jargon defeats you, my guide to your title register and the entries that kill sales decodes it.
• The local land charges register. DFG conditions are local land charges, so they won't necessarily appear on your title register. For many areas this register has migrated to HM Land Registry's national service, where you can do an official search; for others you still apply to the council.
• Your own paperwork. Look for the grant approval letter, the owner's certificate and the "certificate of completion" date. If you can't find them, the council's private sector housing team will hold the file.

What if the council refuses to waive the charge?

Ask for the decision and reasons in writing, then use the council's formal complaints procedure. Point specifically to which of the four matters you think it failed to consider, or considered wrongly. If you're still unhappy once the council's process is exhausted, you can go to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, which handles DFG complaints regularly.

Be realistic, though. The Ombudsman looks at whether the council followed the right process, not whether you'd have preferred a different answer. A council that considered your evidence properly and still decided repayment was reasonable will usually be found not at fault. Your best shot is always a well-evidenced request made before completion.

And don't let the dispute hold your sale hostage. If the council is slow, your solicitor can often agree to retain the maximum possible amount from the proceeds on completion and release the balance to you once the waiver decision comes through. That keeps your buyer happy and your argument alive.

Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland

The 2008 General Consent applies to local housing authorities in England. Wales uses the same 1996 Act framework but sets its own grant limits and conditions through the Welsh Government and each council's housing renewal policy. Scotland doesn't have DFGs at all; adaptations are funded under each council's Scheme of Assistance, with its own conditions. In Northern Ireland, adaptations for owner-occupiers come through the Northern Ireland Housing Executive's grants system. If your home is outside England, don't rely on the £5,000 and £10,000 figures. Ask the body that funded the work for its repayment terms in writing.

Selling an adapted home quickly: what are your options?

Families selling an adapted home are often under time pressure, usually because of a move into care or an estate that needs winding up. Here's how the main routes compare with a DFG or similar charge in the mix:

A cash house buyer can complete in weeks rather than months and won't be put off by adaptations or a land charge, because their solicitor deals with the redemption just as yours would. The trade-off is price: reputable firms typically offer below open-market value, and some poor operators chip their offer late in the process. If speed is genuinely the priority, compare several offers rather than accepting the first. My guide to the best house buying companies explains what to look for, and the main sell house fast page sets out every route side by side.

One thing I'd never do: accept a lower cash offer because a buyer has told you the DFG charge is "a problem". It isn't. It's a figure on a completion statement.

Common mistakes I see (and how to avoid them)

• Paying the full demand without asking for discretion. The consent requires the council to consider your circumstances. Give it the information to do so.
• Leaving it to the week before exchange. Write to the council the day you instruct an agent or accept an offer.
• Assuming death cancels the charge. Under the national consent it doesn't. The Cheshire East case shows exactly what happens if executors don't ask.
• Not checking the 10-year date. If you're 10 years and a few weeks from the certified date, it may be worth waiting.
• Confusing a grant with a loan. A DFG over £5,000 is partly and conditionally repayable; a Lendology or council loan is repayable in full. Know which you have.
• Forgetting discretionary top-ups. The £10,000 cap applies to the mandatory DFG regime. Top-ups may follow different rules.

A quick checklist before you put an adapted home on the market

1. Find the grant approval letter and the certified completion date.
2. Work out whether the grant exceeded £5,000 and whether you're still inside 10 years.
3. Check for any discretionary top-up, relocation grant or loan, and read its own conditions.
4. Download your title register and check for restrictions or charges.
5. If repayment might be due, write to the council asking it to exercise its discretion, citing the four matters with evidence.
6. Tell your solicitor about the charge from day one so they can request figures early.
7. Price the home on its merits as it stands, and decide whether speed or price matters more.

If any of the terms in this guide are new to you, my property jargon explained page translates the conveyancing language into plain English.

The bottom line

A Disabled Facilities Grant charge sounds alarming when it pops up on a search, but it's limited, predictable and often negotiable. At most, under the national rules in England, you're looking at £10,000 from your proceeds, and only if you sell within 10 years and the council decides repayment is reasonable after looking at your circumstances. Ask early, ask properly, and keep the sale moving while you wait for the answer.

If you need to sell an adapted home and want to see what your realistic options look like, you can compare offers from vetted buyers and agents here. It's free, there's no obligation, and you'll know where you stand before you decide anything.