Maintenance charges on flats. Is this average? Or expensive?

Lunchbox

I live in a building with 80 flats, it has 2 lifts and no gym/communal facilities. The service charge is nearer 2500-3000pa and lifts are a reasonable proportion of that. With only 12 flats I suspect this is a low estimate, and you’d likely end up paying more.

worried_jim

It is the lift that massively bumps the price, although I now live in a block without one but my bill has risen to £1600 per year as we have had to pay for new doors @ £600 a pop and other works to be carried out after Grenfrell.

Bored

My service charge is around £2200 per annum for a building with a 24 hour concierge desk, electric gate parking and 4 lifts.

Cakeguts

sazzyy wrote: »

Hi , we are look at some flats in Essex. They are new flats from a converted office block.

The building has 12 one/two bed flats.
It has a lift, a small area to put bikes in, a small ‘gym’ that has 4 machines in, and a gated car park with 1 parking space per flat.

The maintenance charge is about £2,000 per year.

We are first time buyers so I don’t know how much this would normally cost but this does seem quite a lot. Is it? Or is it just the going rate.

Thanks very much :j

I would suggest that you look for flats that aren't new so that you can get an actual cost of the service charge. I would also suggest that you look at flats that don't have a gym or a lift or a gated carpark.



When you have done that you can see how much a flat without all these extras cost in service charges and from that you can work out what the actual service charge on a new flat is likely to be.



No one can tell you what the actual service charge that you will have to pay is for a new flat as what you are being given is an estimate.



Only you can deside if an estimate of £2000 a year is likely to be correct or if it is too low. What is certain is that you will be paying more for a new flat than you would for a second hand one because new properties have a premium on them.



The thing that bothers me most about these flats actually is the gated carpark. That suggests either a high crime area where car vandalism or car theft is high or a general area parking problem and the carpark has to be gated to stop other people from parking in it. I hope that you only intend to ever have one car.

AlexMac

Others have commented fully above, but can I check a detail?

You say

sazzyy wrote: »

....
The maintenance charge is about £2,000 per year.

Do you mean "maintenance charge" or Service Charge?

A Service charge will usually include other stuff; notably buildings insurance, maybe communal lighting or cleaning and the managing agent or company's admin fees...

Sometimes the maintenance charge may just be for routine ongoing repairs, or it may include a surplus element towards a "sinking fund" for major future items or cyclical maintenence like external redecorations every 6-8 years? Or these may be separately billed, divided between flats to a formula based on size or Rateable Values as and when they crop up? This detail should be in the lease and the Freeholder's replies to the "Leasehold Property Enquiries" form which your solicitor will send 'em.

I've paid from £420 p.a - £1,300 pa for the Service charge on the various 1-2 bedroom flats we've lived in or owned (none with a gym or parking) in blocks of between 6-13 flats. In most cases that did not include an admin fee as they were mostly "shared freeholds" where we managed the block ourselves rather than via an agency - so we had total control over charge levels and spending. And in these cases, we were also able to stack significant surpluses away each year, so that by the time we needed a new roof or an external paint job, at costs between £5 - £15k, there was usually enough in the sinking fund to avoid hitting individual leaseholders with a huge extra levy.

So your £2k seems OK if it in includes all or any of this, but less so if you're going to have to cough an extra few hundred or a grand or two for insurance and major repairs?

boromanc89

I live in an apartment in a complex with 4 lifts, for 104 apartments in total. We have a post room but no concierge, gated parking and a central courtyard with trees etc. There is a cleaner, and a caretaker present during the days Mon-Fri who does day to day maintenance jobs and takes the communal bins out. Maintenance works to cladding, balconies etc all inclusive in charges.

Service charge is £1400 every 6 months.
This is city centre of Manchester.

[Deleted User]

My flat is in Eastbourne & I pay £2,108.00 a year for maintenance, thats including my garage maintenance. We don't have any gates or anything fancy though. I think mines quite high, but also it's nice knowing that we all pay that into a pot, so things are periodically fixed.