Cost of maintaining a swimming pool

[WorriedDad23]

We are seriously considering buying a property which comes with a swimming pool, we know it's going to be tough when to comes for the resale but pros outweighs the cons for us atm so we are going to go ahead if the numbers work out.

Just wondering if anyone can share actual costs and involved with maintaining a swimming pool? We are perfectly capable of doing the cleaning it ourselves as the current owners does it themselves.

What chemicals do we have to buy? from where? how often and how much are they?

Which pool maintenance tools do we have to buy?

In what instances do we have to call in the professionals for regular maintenance ? how much do they cost roughly?

Thanks

Expensive part is heating, but we’ve just had solar panels installed, so that will hopefully help a lot.

We also installed a very expensive cover you can theoretically drive over (we don’t) but it means that Im not worried about people falling in when it’s not in use.

There’s no doubt it’s a faff, but we love it and use it a lot. We inherited it when we moved in, but it’s turned out to be great much to our surprise

I know someone with one they said it's around £1000 a month to heat when I asked about it.

How deep is it? Ours is similar size but previous owners made it very deep in the deep end (7ft) so as a result is a large volume of water which equals lots of chemicals, very costly to heat to a usable temperature, and more tricky to clean. I wish it was shallower the shallow end is so much easier to clean!
We have it open for a short season May half term - mid September for cost reasons. In this time the filter and heating goes on overnight as we have an economy 7 electric meter.
i wish it wasn’t there tbh. But on the odd heatwave it is absolutely lovely to share with family and friends.

It’s not £1000pm to heat, but maybe with this years prices who knows 😆
but our ‘heating’ just takes the edge off and it still takes your breath away when you first get in

The size pool you're talking about is similar to ours.
We spend about £250 per season on chemicals and we open / close it each season ourselves so no cost there. But you do need to learn what you're doing and understand how to clean and maintain it. We paid a pool company to teach us the first year and that was money well spent.

As others have said, heating is the big cost. We have both solar panels and an air source heat pump.
The solar panels, although free to run, are rubbish. We only see a difference if we get several sunny days in a row which is rare in the uk.
The air source heat pump is much more consistent, although there is obviously the cost of running it and that varies depending on the outside temperature. A good quality thermal cover is also key to maintaining the heat.

We use ours loads, and swim regularly from May to September. This helps justify the cost and maintenance.

Its not just the heating/cleaning costs/water costs (you will regularly need to top up the pool) you have to factor in. My parents have a large indoor pool, and have now replaced the liner and cover twice. The liner is especially expensive, plus pool has needed a complete overall - including replacement of all surrounding tiles. The boiler and pump have recently been replaced too. I know we’re talking £00000s for the above.

An estate agent friend of ours said, that pools need to be of a high end construction and in very good condition when selling a property, as otherwise they will detract from the value of the house. They are very expensive to maintain properly (in this country anyway). You will need deep pockets.

will be even more expensive this year with energy rises and generally you have to open it each year even just for a few weeks even if weather is pants. Boiler usually an annual service and cleaning - you can do it yourself - get a wet suit and be prepared for alot of work and scrubbing or get a company in they are no cheap and you will need to pull the cover over or use the net on the pole to regularly get the debris out, especially after windy weather. They are great when weather is scorchio but often still too cold even when heated when the weather is like it is today.

Liner usually does a good 10 years of a decent quality.

Heating is the big cost and if you don't heat it you'll not use it much. I have a large oil boiler connected to mine and £50 in oil will get me 3-4 days of useful use. The key here is to be fastidious in replacing the pool cover immediately the pool isn't in use to help retain the heat.

Chemicals can be a small or large cost depending on how well you regulate the pool chemistry. Keep the PH correct, chlorine+stabliser dosed, filtering the water, and keeping debris out will keep your chemical costs low. I spend about £80 a year on chemicals.

I seem to recall that it was said "if you heat up a sixpence to the same as the surface temperature of Venus it could burn up all of Europe"
Perhaps if you only heat it halfway to the temperature of Venus and then dropped it into your pool that would warm it up enough?
I have a couple of old sixpence if you need them.