Service Charge- Monthly/ Anually?

Stubbsy05

Just wondering how everyone pays their service charge. Monthly? Anually? I have owned my property for 4 months and have not heard anything from the managment company as yet. I believe it may be charged per 6 months.

Also can you question it if the service charge seems abnotmally high?

Stubbsy05

The people I bought from had a very hard year last year. Security lighting, internal decoration e.t.c.
Our sinking fund has been spent on external decoration this year. I'm just waiting for my charge to come through at some point.

Its the one thing I hate about leasehold ownership

illmonkey

contact the maintenance company ASAP. We didnt know either, after 8 months of living there, we get a bill for £300+ ! Apparently its monthly, but no one else chased it. Its only a block of 6 flats, so he knew we were moving it, i'd talked to him about it!

We couldnt afford to pay it outright, so were paying double for the next 8 months too

BargainJunky

My mom used to pay her service charge six monthly. It started off in Year 1 for a new build apartment at around £700 and three years later was around £900. I believe they also had a shortfall at the time she moved out.

The charge covered buildings insurance, cleaning communal areas, cleaning windows monthly and gardening. There was an electric gate where she lived and this drained the funds substantially and they did have some reserved for decorating communal areas but this did not happen in the time she had the apartment.

I dont think she fared too badly on the charges but she will tell another story!

hazeyj

It all depends on the lease how often you can collect the service charge and
service charge is usually calculated per sq ft.

You can always ask your managing agent/freeholder for a breakdown of all costs associate with the building.

Normally, its building insurance, maintainence agreements, management (per apt), utility bills, building maintainence, sinking fund, fire alarm maintainance, phone line (if applic), caretaker wages etc...

Unfortunately when you live in an apt block you do have to pay for upkeep on the whole building, most people seem to forget about this.

mrsc_4

We moved out of our flat in December but we used to pay £35 a month, £5 of this went into the roofing fund though. Our costs were kept low because everything was kept in house, the people who lived above us managed the management company and her husband did all the maintaince around the flats and the gardening. It worked really well for us.

cattie

In each of the leasehold flats I've owned the service charge has been paid quarterly.