Shared garden - new lawn mower

[AmandaTanen]

I live in a tenement, 8 flats in a block, and we have a shared garden and bin recess area. We have cut the grass and kept the garden neat and tidy since we moved in, this is easier for us as we own the old coal store so can keep a few tools in it. The lawnmower is now bust. I was thinking of asking our neighbours to contribute to the cost of it, and if they wanted to they can have use of it. My DH thinks its too cheeky to ask for say a 10 contribution and we should just get it ourselves. Thoughts please? and any suggestions for a note that I could pop through the doors. Thanks

I wouldn't, because you get to choose what mower you want, if you pay for it, and get to take it with you when you leave. If it becomes a shared mower, you're presuming that the next person who has your flat, and the tool shed, will automatically want to take this over. They may not.

I'd just keep it simple, your mower and you're happy to mow for everyone. or buy a goat

I don't think it's cheeky. You're already giving up your time to keep the shared garden mowed, I don't think it's too much to ask the other owners to contribute to the cost of the mower. I don't think asking them means you have to give them input on what mower you buy. But if you moved, I do think you've have to leave the mower behind.

I do a note along the lines of 'We've always been quite happy to cut the grass in the shared garden, but unfortunately now our mower has died and we were hoping that each flat would be willing to contribute 10 each towards thec cost of a new mower. We would, of course, leave the mower behind if we ever moved out.'

You could write a note saying-

Hi, I have voluntarily cut the shared grass until now, but unfortunately my lawnmower has broken and can't be fixed. So we need to decide what to do from now. I'd be happy to continue cutting the grass if we buy a shared mower, we could share the grass cutting between us, we could look into getting a gardener to do it, or maybe someone has another idea. Hopefully we can decide by (e.g. the end of the month) as the grass will need to be cut by then.

I'd put one in the shared entrance and leave room for comments.