Splitting repointing costs in converted house

GenreLapel

Hi. I'm trying to work out how to fairly split the costs for brick repointing on a London terraced house split into flats.

I own the ground floor and the other owner owns the other 2 floors + loft conversion. We own the freehold 50:50. He rents his part out to 3 tenants. They recently spotted some damp so he's been getting quotes for maintenance & repairs.

I noticed some issues with the gutters. Apparently they were badly installed and haven't been maintained well so had completely clogged. He paid for having them cleared. Now he's getting in quotes for having the brickwork repointed. He's suggesting that I pay one third of the costs as I have one floor. That by itself seems pretty reasonable, except that my floor has very little exposed brickwork (maybe 12% of the house's total) and I think he also wants to split the scaffolding cost when of course none would be needed for my floor.

For context, the house insurance cost is split 50:50 and as far as I know (I very recently inherited this place) maintenance costs have been paid by whoever owns the part it's being done on. E.g. when we had repointing done semi-recently on a different part of the house for just our floor, we paid for it, since that just made sense.

My floor's brickwork is small enough that I can go outside and measure it with a measuring tape. I'm not convinced that I should pay so much, but I want to get other opinions.

Thanks!

TELLIT01

If damp is starting to penetrate it could easily affect the property of the OP before long so they have just as much to gain as the other flat owner in getting the work done.  Does the OP think the owner of the upper flat should cover the entire cost of roof repairs as they are the only one with a roof over their property?

gwynlas

I think asking you for a third is fair given everythin else split 50/50.

Maintenance charges are usually outlined in a lease

GenreLapel

Yeah, that's fair. I wouldn't question going 50:50 on the roof, I guess I was too focused on the surface area of the brickwork and the stark difference there.

Albermarle

You could always negotiate. If you make a reasonable offer, based on the points you have made, it should not cause any upset. They can always say no.
Maybe go for 25% ?