Leases for Crown land are bought and sold similarly to freehold property. However, when you purchase a lease, you are buying the improvements on the leased land and the right to lease the land from the state.
The Purchasing Crown leasehold land to obtain freehold title policy (PDF, 553 KB) outlines the framework for us to assess and determine applications to purchase a lease.
If you wish to object to the purchase price for Crown leasehold land, you can find more information in the objection to purchase price when purchasing Crown leasehold land policy (PDF, 288 KB).
For further details on purchasing a lease, refer to the purchasing Crown leasehold land to obtain freehold title guideline (PDF, 377 KB).
Steps to buy a lease
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Check eligibility
Ensure you meet the criteria to buy a Crown land lease.
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Submit application
Complete the online application form and provide all necessary documents.
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Assessment
We will assess your application.
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Approval
If approved, you will receive an offer to purchase the lease.
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Payment
Pay the required fees as invoiced.
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Finalisation
Once payment is received, the lease transfer will be finalised.
Purchasing a Wentworth or Hay Irrigation Act lease
To buy a Wentworth or Hay Irrigation lease, leaseholders must pay the purchase price and other costs like stamp duty, GST, and fees.
There are 2 payment options:
- full payment within 28 days
- instalments over up to 20 years.
Leaseholders must keep paying rent while their application is processed. Once approved, rent payments stop. We will also consider public access rights, Crown timber rights, and other uses of the lease during the application.
Western lands leaseholders
The Crown Land Management Act 2016 (the CLM Act) allows eligible leaseholders to purchase their Western lands lease, which will convert the title to freehold.
Find out more about purchasing Western lands leases.
Incomplete purchases
An incomplete purchase is a tenure describing a former lease from us that is in the process of being purchased. Some of these tenures were also previously known as:
- auction purchases
- after-auction purchases
- conditional purchases
- improvement purchases
- residential lease purchases
- returned soldiers special holding purchases
- settlement purchases
- soldiers group purchases
- special purchases
- suburban holding purchases
- tender purchases
- after-tender purchases
- town lands lease purchases
- weekend lease purchases
- irrigation farm purchases
- non-irrigable purchases
- town land purchases.
If your incomplete purchase was granted before the commencement of the Crown Land Management Act 2016 on 1 July 2018, you will continue to pay instalments, interest and any other amounts payable in the same way and the same amounts over the agreed timeframe.
If your incomplete purchase was granted after the commencement of the Crown Land Management Act 2016, on 1 July 2018 some new options are available. For example, you will have the option of paying the purchase price in annual instalments (including interest) over a period of up to 20 years, subject to a minimum annual instalment.
Extra payments may also be made at any time during the term of the purchase and there are no penalties for paying out the incomplete purchase early. Purchasers may also consider pursuing external finance arrangements.
While the land remains as an incomplete purchase it will have notations on the certificate of title that record our interest in the land. These notations relate to the requirement for payment of the balance of purchase and other monies, forfeiture provisions, and restrictions on subdivision.
When all monies owing to us have been paid, we will lodge a dealing form with NSW Land Registry Services, which will remove the notations from the title.
Where an incomplete purchase is transferred with monies still owing, the Crown Land Management Act 2016 requires all outstanding monies to be paid in full within three months of the registration of the transfer.
Affected parties may request an exception, using the criteria listed below. If approval is given using this exception, the new owner can continue with the existing payment structure.
- a devise under a will
- the taking of an interest under an intestacy
- survivorship of a joint tenant
- a discharge of mortgage
- a transfer to the Official Trustee in Bankruptcy
- a transfer by order of the Family Court or under a provision of the Family Law Act 1975 the Commonwealth (except a transfer to a person who is not a party to, or a child of, the marriage)
- a transfer by order of any other court (except a transfer effected under a writ of execution) if the minister has directed that this clause is not to apply to the transfer.
Fees
We will send you an invoice for any fees after we receive your application.