Grants when you buy, build or fix a croft house
Every island postcode sits in the Croft House Grant's high priority area, and the money that comes with it carries conditions that last ten years.
In brief
- The Croft House Grant pays £38,000 towards a new house in a high priority area, 60% of costs for reconstructing or improving one and 80% for energy-efficiency work, both capped at £38,000. That ceiling is per applicant in any ten-year period.
- Every one of the 910 postcodes the scheme lists under Eilean Siar, its own label for the council area, is high priority. None is standard.
- You have to be a tenant crofter, an owner-occupier crofter or a cottar, be inadequately housed or need to live on the croft, make the house your only or principal home, and intend to work the croft. Holiday homes and business use are excluded.
- The conditions are registered against the title for ten years, and a breach can bring a demand to repay with interest at 8% over base rate.
- Do not start work before approval. Applications close quarterly and are scored against a threshold each time.
Who the Croft House Grant is for
The scheme exists because crofting law requires a crofter to live on or within 32 kilometres of the croft and to provide their own house, and because building costs more where the materials and the trades come over the water.
It is open to a tenant crofter, an owner-occupier crofter or a cottar, each as defined in the Crofters (Scotland) Act 1993. That rules out the buyer of a decrofted house on an ordinary title, which is one of the three things advertised as a croft: buying a croft or a house on a croft sets out the difference, and the crofts advertised today are gathered on one page. You also have to be inadequately housed, or need to live on the croft for the activity you do or propose. The guidance's definition of inadequately housed covers living with parents or in a caravan, renting, accommodation that is too small or below an adequate standard, and, for the energy strand only, a home with an EPC rating below C. A temporary arrangement, such as renting while waiting to build, does not count, and the assisted house must become your only or principal home.
You are out if you will not commit to working the croft in a reasonable time, if another public grant covers the same work, if any part of the funded building will be used for bed and breakfast, a holiday home or a workspace, or if your asset value is over £150,000, worked out as the value of any property you keep less the mortgage on it. Applications are also refused where there is already a house on the croft, where the project costs under £8,000 including VAT, where a Croft House Grant was paid in the last ten years, or where work has already started.
How much, and what the money can go on
The scheme has two tiers by postcode and the islands sit entirely in the higher one: Annex C to the guidance marks all 910 postcodes it lists under Eilean Siar, its own label for the council area, as high priority. The rates on 15 September 2026 were these.
| Work | Grant in a high priority area |
|---|---|
| New house | £38,000 |
| Reconstruction or improvement | 60% of eligible costs, up to £38,000 |
| Energy-efficiency measures | 80% of eligible costs, up to £38,000 |
A new house is capped on floor area by house type, from 112 square metres for a two-bedroom single-storey house to 199 for a five-bedroom house over two storeys. Building on a plot covers planning and warrants, and the land and plots page carries bare ground. An energy application needs an EPC below C before applying.
The ten-year conditions
A notice of grant conditions is registered in the Land Register, or recorded in the Sasine register, for ten years. The house has to be occupied by you or your family as an only or principal home, and if you leave, the next occupant must be another crofter, owner-occupier or cottar approved by Scottish Ministers. It must be kept in good repair and insured, and any sale, lease, assignation or sub-let of the house or the croft has to be notified in writing and consented to first. A breach inside the period can bring a demand to repay the outstanding proportion with interest at 8% above the Bank of England base rate.
For a buyer that is the paragraph to read twice: a croft house built or improved with grant money in the last decade carries those conditions with it. Ask the seller's solicitor for the notice before offering.
How to apply, and when
A Business Reference Number from Rural Payments comes first, then the application form for the strand you want; an agent may help, but the crofter signs and submits. Closing dates are quarterly, on 1 March, 1 June, 1 September and 1 December, and eligible applications are scored on current accommodation, how long the croft has been held and what has been done with it, household income, any property that could be sold to fund the work, and crofting activity. The Scottish Government sets a threshold each quarter and everything at or above it gets an offer.
The rule people break most often is starting early. Design work, planning and warrant applications and utility applications are allowed before approval but attract no grant; any construction before approval makes those costs ineligible, and an application that includes started work is rejected.
The Crofting Agricultural Grant Scheme
The Crofting Agricultural Grant Scheme funds the croft rather than the house: agricultural buildings, drainage, handling facilities, water supplies, access tracks and similar capital work, including your own labour and the cost of shipping materials in. An individual crofter can get up to £25,000 in any two-year period and a group up to £125,000, at a rate that depends on where the croft is and whether the applicant is a new entrant. Nothing may be started or bought before approval, and the work has to be claimed within a year.
Buying an empty house instead
The Comhairle runs an Empty Homes Project with a dedicated officer, and what it offers an owner is free advice rather than money: house condition surveys, empty property discounts, VAT exemptions for renovating an empty property, and advice on letting or selling. Buying an empty or derelict house covers that purchase, including the Match Maker Scheme, which is the part of the project open to a buyer.
Council tax helps too. A home empty for over a year, bought within the last six months and demonstrably under repair, cannot be charged the empty homes premium for those six months, and the council can extend that. Council tax on a second home has the premium itself.
Sources
- Rural Payments and Services, Croft House Grant full guidance — eligibility, the rates, the ten-year conditions and the scoring. 17 March 2026, checked 15 September 2026.
- Rural Payments and Services, high and standard priority area postcodes (Annex C) — all 910 Eilean Siar postcodes, every one high priority. Checked 15 September 2026.
- Rural Payments and Services, Crofting Agricultural Grant Scheme — what it funds, the £25,000 and £125,000 ceilings, the conditions. Checked 15 September 2026.
- Rural Payments and Services, CAGS eligibility criteria — who may apply and on what terms. Checked 15 September 2026.
- Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, Empty Homes Project — the free advice list and the Match Maker Scheme. Checked 15 September 2026.
- The Council Tax (Variation for Unoccupied Dwellings) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2023 — the six-month renovation exclusion. Checked 15 September 2026.
- mygov.scot, council tax for empty homes and second homes — the same exclusion in plain words. Updated 1 April 2026, checked 15 September 2026.
- Scottish Empty Homes Partnership, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar — the islands' empty homes figures. Checked 15 September 2026.
- welovestornoway.com, grants for croft house energy savings (5 July 2023) — the date the energy-efficiency strand was added. Checked 15 September 2026.
Last checked 15 September 2026. Every source named above was read on that date, and rules, rates and timetables all move, so check the current position before you rely on a figure here. Corrections to hello@outerhebridesproperty.co.uk.