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can they afford home ownership?
This. We have no service charge and all leaseholders (6 maisonettes in three terraced houses) share responsibility for maintenance. In practice, individual flats fix things that directly affect them. The number of tire kickers we had that got scared by there being no SF was shocking, to me. I think they are told that the sinking fund will cover anything that comes up in future. Which just isn't the case. I, personally, would much rather it be the way it is than have to deal with the additional admin overhead and likely shit value for money of there being a heft service charge. Also, it's not like it's a block of 50 flats, there's only so much can go wrong.
/jinx
stevo_com-
This.
Ex Local places have their own set of risks that are significantly greater than private properties. Major works bills running in to the tens of thousands are the norm. £80,000 is possible. It's kind of a scandal. There's no limits.
Surprise, nobody wants to be the one left holding the baby. The prolonged maintenance cycles they seem to do creates particularly crazy scenarios where a family will RTB then live for 30 years and pay fuck all then the next lot moves in and gets a £20k bill for the next forty years of use of which they might use, say, two years. And of course they have no choice as to what is done, when, and by who and on what payment terms.
OK, you can get that kind of thing in private estates but it's unlikely - the 'everyone is a stakeholder' model means shorter maintenances cycles and better kept estates. Ignoring cladding scandals. Sigh.
Howard
I have a no ground rent, leasehold on a flat, no sinking fund.
Either I can let the landlord S20 us, or we can take on wear and tear maintenance ourselves. We're doing the latter for roof work currently.
I personally don't think it's necessary, the only question is whether people have enough savings to cover unexpected 4 and 5 figure surprises in the future. If they don't... sinking funds give a degree of peace of mind (but can still fall short).
I'm meh on it... if it's such a concern, can they afford home ownership? I have more questions about who controls the sinking fund and who gets quotes and authorises work.