To think dd should not buy this house

[sundaychairtree]

Dd23 had been looking for a house for a long time and finally found a cheap one she liked. It is an ex-MOD 2 bed house on a military base which has been sold to a large housing company which is now selling it on. The house was listed as freehold and she has paid around £1000 in search fees. It turns out that tge house incurs a significant service charge to the housibg company for maintenence of the estate which is sermingly owned by the housing company. It is connected to military water/sewerage company so she has to oay for that, but presumably that is instead of the water company. But also for road maintenance and streetlighting and cleaning as well as council tax. One of the itemscis tge upkeep if a community centre which only seems to host events for military families. The solicitor has obtained copies of the last 5 years charges levied on previous military tenants. I feel like all this shoukd have been mentioned in the estate agents sales particulars. I think she would be effectively signing a blank cheque for service charges and management fes which this company can increase at will.
Should she run a mile?

I wouldn't touch it.

Nor me.

I wouldn’t buy it. She will find it hard to sell.

Too many potential issues - personally wouldn't touch it.

I wouldn’t touch it either. My mum has just recently moved from a place where initially it was just over £1000 per year in service charges (back in 2020) but 5 years later it had crept up to £2400 per year. Insane. My mum wasn’t made aware it would go up that much within just a few years. Your daughter needs to look into this more.

Seeing what my mum went through has really opened my eyes and I’ll be making sure my daughter is made aware of these things, when the time comes for her to be buying anywhere.

Run don't walk.

It will be 2 problems for her.

1. As an ongoing cost. I have seen service charged go from £400 to £4k pa in 8 years for the same services!!! Actually crazy and somehow legal - which it shouldnt be)
2. When she inevitably tries to sell

In my 20s (and in my 40s actually) I have always looked for "regular" properties with nothing too weird or irregular about them. This means

• faster sales
• ability to sell in a soft market
• faster liquidity/ more flexibility

It was served me very well

definitely No. The 1000 she’s spent so far is nothing compared to the likely cost of living there. Run.

No way, I’d she going to retire there? If not, no - it’ll be hard to sell

A friend's DS bought a house in a similar situation, turned out he also had to pay council tax on top of paying the management company for the same thing. The roads were resurfaced only a couple of years after moving in, he had to contribute to that too.
I would run away from the property.

Most new housing estates have a service charge as council’s will not adopt them. Military houses tend to be well built with big gardens and large rooms. What are the terms for them to increase the maintenance and how much will it be?

I would speak to the estate agent about information not being provided as it should have been and for them to give some money to cover the cost of the searches if she uses them for the next/alternative property. After all, she only paid for those searches based on their false information. I’m sure there is a clause somewhere to protect them but better to ask.

No don’t do it unless she plans to retire there.

And if she is going to retire there, who wants to be paying huge extra charges on a pension?

Look at it this way:
The investment in the searches has saved her thousands in add on costs and inability to sell.

And I wouldn’t assume the water and sewerage costs are instead of the regular bills. They could well be in addition.

And her council tax would go to pay for everyone else’s road repairs and street lighting while she pays separately for her own.

If £1000 feels like a lot, service charges are going to be a huge barrier.

Interesting about the estate agent’s potential liability for that.

Estate agents blurb normally mentions if the sellers have advised the property is mains gas, mains drainage etc. If the blurb doesn’t mention that something is normally being hidden!

Normal get out clause is nothing in the particulars should be taken as gospel etc.

There's a reason it's cheap and this is it

I do think it will be difficult to get any cash out of it he estate agent

This is what you pay the search fees for - sometimes the searches uncover some significant issues. I would not buy this house.

This. It's never cheap because the searcher has got lucky and found a bargain. It's cheap for a reason. Walk away and be thankful the searches found what they were supposed to.

Obviously it’s ultimately her decision, but if she’s asked for your advice, I’d advise her against it. It sounds like a way to generate extra cash from military housing without actually changing it to a civilian community.

Wow , thank you so much for your responses which seem unanimous. I have checked out tbe law and the EA should definitely have disclosed the service charges, so she will ask her solicitor about that.