whos is responsible for communal repairs when all 4 properties in a 4 in a block are bought. eg. roof/gutters?

Question

leaking roof and leaking toilet waste. i am on top floor with water coming in ceiling and my neighbour below has waste water coming into his garden through hole at the bottom of pipe

Answer 1

Hi,

Firstly you need to establish whether the property is leasehold or freehold. If the property is freehold then you all own a part of it and you need to either appoint a management company or alternatively start a management committee.

If you are lease hold, then the likely hood is that you pay some form of service charge which should include a sink fund. If it is a leasehold the owner of the freehold is usually responsible for the maintenance of the common areas. That is the purpose of the service charge etc.

If you have a few more details about your lease/ freehold arrangements it would help.

However from the sound of it you currently do not seem to have anyone maintaining your property. If you have incurred damage due to free holder negligence you MAY have a case under the law of Tort to recover some of these monies.

If you are all freeholders then you will need to pay for it yourselves between the four of you however I advise you appoint a legal Representative to set up an agreement on how costs are dealt with or you might end up with the bill and doing the work yourself.

Hope this helps.

Answer 2

I live in a communal close with five other families as far as I'm aware everyone is responsible for the communal repairs of the building your repair Billl should be split four ways as ours is split six ways,If you have anyone in the property who refuses to pay you are entitled to take them to court for settlement.The roof is a communal repair and the waste pipes are also the same you should all get together and agree on the repairs and one call round for quotes then make sure you get the money before the jobs are done or you might be liable to pay as you have phoned check out your deeds to the building they should be able to tell you more on what is a shared repair and whats not.
What we al do in our building is collect £3.00 a week and it's in an account with and when there is a repair the bil is covered been doing this for years and we've saved a fortune in claiming through our insurance Premiums stay down.

Answer 3

Hi I live in a small block of 16 flats 11 are privately owned 5 are local council owned. When you buy a flat you only buy the inside the outside in my case is owned by the local council. Any repairs to the outside is the responsibility of the local council which in turn will pass the cost on to you. I live on the ground floor but if the roof needs repairing everyone has to pay 1/16th part of the cost. Check your deeds to find out who is responsible for the intital repair and take it from there.

Answer 4

I would think split the cost 4 ways would make sense. If the repairs are affecting only one or even two units then I would think the owners of the affected units would be responsible. Did you sign a contract upon purchase most multi family buildings have some sort of contract which should explain your, and your fellow tennants resposiblity to repair. With all that stuff though it sounds more like you need to move!

Answer 5

See your leashehold agreement (deeds).

Normally there is a management company to which you pay an annual "management charge". This management company exists to manage these types of things.

Their annual charge may only cover normal running costs (communal lighting, gardening, etc), and they may make a special charge for repair work (roofing, fencing, re-pointing, plumbing etc) for areas which do not fall inside one of the flats.

You should know if you pay an annual management charge, you should know who it is to, and you can contact them.

They should be responsible.

However they are not responsible to cover any of the cost, they will demand money from each of the flat owners to cover the total cost of any work, you say 4 flats, so let's assume each flat pays 25% (but you should check your deeds for correctness).

Also, if they say some work needs doing, and it costs £'000s, as long as you cannot prove they are incorrect, you have to pay them your share of the money, or you will have broken your leasehold agreement, and can therefore lose your flat.

Management companies, hence flats, can be a nightmare.

Answer 6

it should be in your contract when you bought if not then assume you all are, talk to your neighbours get a kitty together. If someone outside the flats holds the lease they may pay for some repairs but I doubt it.

Answer 7

You have to split the cost four ways.

Answer 8

all of the owners, see your factor for details as that's why you pay factoring fees, you can claim grants from local council.

Answer 9

it is a shared thing you should pay 25% of all cost