Retirement flats

[Ilkleymoor]

Anyone got any experience of buying a retirement flat for a parent?

Have seen a couple of decent ones in the right area, one slightly better as hasn't got the care element which I think would be refused but it's shared ownership of 70% and has been on the market for a few months.

Would this be very difficult to sell on? I'd be getting the mortgage so need to think through the effects on me too.

They’re very difficult to sell on due to high service charges (usually for on site staff and alarm systems) and because the management can refuse to allow them to be bought by somebody who doesn’t meet their criteria / has very high care needs etc.

Ah, ok, interesting. This one has very low service charge like £95 a month including heating and council tax, so it must be aimed at people who don't have any needs other than the benefit of a ground floor flat.

Bit annoying, it looks like a nice flat, safe area, ground floor, good public transport. Whereas the normal places I could afford are in a much less salubrious area.

There are usually rules about who can own / live there e.g. the obvious age restrictions. I don't think that they would let you buy in order for your parent to live there.

There was a long thread on here a couple of weeks ago about the difficulties of selling flats in retirement villages.

I mean, they are ideal for many people to live in, for so many reasons, but there were a lot of posters giving experiences of the down sides as well.