An estate in land which provides the holder of the estate with rights of possession and use of the land but not ownership. The freehold is retained by the freeholder who grants the lease (also referred to as a tenancy) as the landlord (also referred to as the lessor) to the holder of the estate, who is referred to as the tenant or lessee. There can be strings of leases granted so, for example, the freeholder may grant a lease (head lease/superior lease) to a tenant (head/superior tenant) who in turn may grant a lease (underlease/sublease) to an undertenant/subtenant who in turn may grant a sub-underlease to sub-undertenant, and so on.

There are three categories of leasehold estates: