Owners of (freehold) houses ....plse talk to me about longterm exterior repairs/maintanance budget...

[Maiden2021]

...for a roof, wall, driveway etc. [This is not a house renovation on purchasing thread.]

I lived in a brand new house for 2 years and it was lovely as nothing needed doing.

However, I am considering buying an old 2 or 3 bed freehold house in central London (as in previously lived in for 4/3 decades as most of central London is).

I have had leaseholds (this is not a thread about leasehold bashing) so I have the experience of doing up all interiors including a complete interior renovation- new bathroom, new kitchen, wardrobes, fence etc. I have also done double glazing windows on a large 3 bed flat, so I know the costs involved in all of that.)

1.However, I am wondering what maintenance budget I should have for having the responsibility of the whole house, albeit small house, especially for the exterior. I used google months ago, and I think it gave me something around £38K a year.

2.If your roof caved in in your current house, how much will it cost you to fix- do you know; are you concerned; and do people just take out a second mortgage for things like that ( I read that a lot here but I want to be prepared.)
3.Can I take out sound (but not too expensive) insurance for the exterior works to the freehold house?
4.I like to think ahead but can't make up my mind ( as retirement is too far away) if I want to retire in the country (brand new house) or in London but I don't think living in a leasehold flat/ house in London when I am old/older is what I want to do as the Management companies seem to charge so much for 'maintanance'. Hence I'm thinking a small freehold house. I might move to another country anyway, but don't want to put all my eggs in one basket and fail to make the necessary planning while I still can, I decide against the move when the time comes.

Thank you very much.

To answer some of your questions:

1. Age and build of house are going affect this eg rendering that is painted is going to need more up keep as are wooden windows over standard brick and plastic windows.
2. Your survey is going to give you an indication of roof work is likely to be needed in the time you are in the house and you can get quotes before you buy to factor this into your decision.
3. Not as far as I am aware.
4. If you are the freeholder you can plan works yourself so there are fewer surprises.

Buildings insurance (often sold jointly with contents insurance) is a must. Roof repairs should be covered although there will be an excess limit and the smaller that is the more expensive the insurance. I have a 2 bed 1880's mid terrace and my insurance is about £25/month. In the 6 years I have lived here I have spent £750 on external painting; £900 on repointing; £250 for a new lintel above the back door; £600 on new guttering and facia boards. So around £400/year. I have not claimed any of the above on my insurance.

@Lonecatwithkitten
@fourquenelles

Thank you so much for your posts. I worried none would respond especially with central London being mentioned, but I needed posts to be more relevant to my situation.

Yes, I plan to get all different types of surveys possible, done before I buy. Thank you for advising to factor in roof costs upon receiving survey reports before I buy- it makes sense.

Insurance- the premium sounds reasonable. Yes, I won't claim on insurance for most things under £1K and possibly under 2K as I know it just puts up insurance premium.

Also, good to hear I can plan and budget for repairs myself as opposed to being 'fleeced' by management companies of leaseholds at will- the main purpose of this thread- thank you again. I even have a share of a freehold in one flat in central London ( I had hoped it could be my forever home as it is large enough- still love it) and I am part of the management, but still, just too much hassle, arguing amongst each other and stress, and I don't think I want that in old age. So thinking of flipping it for a small house. I always thought I could still keep it even if got a small house, but again, I am increasingly doubting this second responsibility in old age (the unnecessary arguments by others amongst each other due to their 'history' is getting tiring'). Currently manageable as I am still youngish, have a calm head (I am currently the only one keeping things together as I am impartial and not biased) and I don't react (who knows what old me 30/40 years on will be like!) and have time and energy and know property law, but it's not healthy to stay there in old age, I don't think.

I will definitely save all these useful posts (I like to analyse and do more research) when I decide to go out there in a few years.

There is maintenance as opposed to incidents. You need to put aside money each month for maintenance, ideally, whereas incidents would be claimed for on insurance. So patching up a bit of roof where costs are in the hundreds would be from your maintenance fund. Storm damage resulting in a chimney pot crashing through into the loft (making this up but you get the idea) - that might be an insurance job.

£38k per year is nuts. Most people wouldn’t spend anything like that! More likely some years you spend very little and other years quite a bit.

There's no budget. Maybe 1k to paint every few years. Big jobs are one off. How much for a new roof? I did a whole extension the size of a two bed house with rook for 75k. However just a roof I'd expect to be more than slapping a roof on a new extension.

New drive quote is 10k. Once it's done I'd expect it to last for my lifetime

In the 6 years I have lived here I have spent £750 on external painting; £900 on repointing; £250 for a new lintel above the back door; £600 on new guttering and facia boards. So around £400/year. I have not claimed any of the above on my insurance

Insurance wont pay out for any of these! They're bog standard maintenance jobs.

Insurance policies usually cover subsidence and heave (movement of foundations) albeit with a hefty excess, but they won't cover a roof that collapses due to age or even structural weaknesses like failed lintels or bulging walls.

@WhoHidTheCoffee

Thank you. All well articulated points made- I will make a note and read slowly to take it all in- I need to hear it all. I was really put off by £38K p/a figures and for a while thought a flat was my only option, but realising I cannot stay there in old age, pushed me to post here to speak to real people.

Question re money put away for maintanance- I won't be working as will be a pensioner, so need to have a healthy lump sum before I decide if I want to receive care here as have paid so much tax and never been sick or move abroad somewhere cheaper but will have huge health care costs as it is all private (Another plan is to takeout medical insurance for the foreign country so long). Or I might die a quick death anyway- sorry for this, but I'm planning while youngish.

Am I missing something here or is the freehold thing a red herring. If you own a leasehold house you're still responsible for any external repairs. Or at least that's been the case for every leasehold house I've ever been aware of.

@RubyWedding 'but they won't cover a roof that collapses due to age or even structural weaknesses like failed lintels or bulging walls.'

Thank you

A flat at our small block did claim on subsistence and ground movements caused by neighbour's tree. So, I have seen that. However, it almost made our building uninsurable the following year.

@nebulae Sorry if not clear.

It must be a freehold- that's not the issue.

However, although the management company fleeces leaseholders, they arrange for everything and charge whatever and the costs are SHARED.

What I want is my own small freehold house, in old age, and I have never been SOLELY financially responsible for paying for the exterior. So, need to consider the budget before I do it.

However, although the management company fleeces leaseholders, they arrange for everything and charge whatever and the costs are SHARED.

This only really applies to flats though Leasehold house owners would sort their own repairs out. So if what you want is to avoid a management company being in charge of repairs to the roof etc, it doesn't matter whether you buy a freehold or leasehold house.

Older small house in country village here.

£3k p.a. covers all my regular maintenance costs inside and out.

That includes, servicing costs for boiler, tanks, alarms £300 p.a.), chimney sweep (£100 p.a.) window cleaning (£120 p.a.), appliance replacement, garden maintenance, painting inside and out and miscellaneous plumbing, electrical repairs.

i put £250 away each month into a separate bank account and just pay maintenance costs from there. The interior and exterior painting gets done on a 4 year rota paid from the fund.

The fund is always in credit. If the credit builds up I sweep any excess into a ‘disaster fund’ used to deal with things like broken roof tiles, leaking chimney flashing etc. etc.

Have never claimed for anything through Insurance for two reasons. Firstly Insurance doesn’t cover maintenance. It is designed to cover specific events like flooding, fire, subsidence etc. Secondly it impacts premiums if you ever do claim. I keep the excess on my Policy fairly high and the Premiums low, in the knowledge that it is really only there for a disaster.

Key to all this is a good survey at the outset so I knew what big ticket items I faced (e.g. boiler repair (every 10 years approx) woodworm treatment (every 20 years) etc) and putting a long term budget in place to specifically deal with those items.

No one is spending £38k a year on property maintenance unless they live in a mansion!

I have owned my own freehold home for over 12 years, 2 different houses, 1 about 15 years old, 1 50 years old. In that time I haven't had any significant costs to maintain the houses externally. Window cleaning is probably the biggest regular cost at £20 a month as it includes a large conservatory.

38k a year is a ridiculous figure, we wouldn't be able to afford to eat if we were spending that each year on keeping the house standing up.

I’ve spent almost 20k this year, but that is because the owners before me were not maintaining it well, think they were just focused on moving and not wanting to spend anything extra.

So I’ve spent around 2k on new windows, 1.5k on new door, 1k new garage door, £700 on having the outside painted, £4.5k on roof improvements. But I’m hoping that will be it for a few years now apart from painting inside which I can do myself. Now I’ve had these things done they should last at least a decade. I got a quote for replacing the whole roof which was around 10k, but mine is a small roof and I have seen people say theirs cost more like 20k

If the property is in good repair a few hundred a year max.
Sudden issues such as storm damage are covered by insurance.
A survey would tell you the state of the roof but rooves don’t need doing often every 50 years or so with modern felts

A few £100 per year to cover annual costs like servicing heating and clearing gutters. That kind of thing also nips other problems in the bud.

We have a regular saver account with good interest rate and save monthly into it. That then pays for those regular annual costs but also builds up so if we do need something bigger (broken appliance, new boiler) the money is there.

Then depends on condition of house when you bought it. Roofs should last years, possibly with some minor repairs for slipped tiles occasionally. Flat roofs may be only 15-20 years but a survey tells you the condition and you can then budget for repairs.

@CaramelMac @Diymesss @Whyohwhyohwhy123 @Whitesandblueskies @amqpeonat @RidingMyBike

Good morning all- aren't you all amazingly wonderful! Thank you very much.

This is the exact info I needed but was hesitant to ask. Luckily I will have quite a good amount at the time of purchase (and physical energy) so I will consider anything and everything I could do straight away; followed by regular yearly maintenance of the house and; the monthly maintanance and disaster funds. yes, I will also try to avoid claiming on insurance. I really don't want to leave the UK in old age and do love living in the centre of London within a walking distance of everything I ever need and it adds years to my life and gives me quality of life too. Think of all the museums I could just walk to, flower shops, good food, lovely national parks or just hide away in my lovely small freehold house without needing to deal with management companies or other leaseholder owners of flats. I just don't want to be in a flat even with a share of a freehold because everything is relentless.

I will save all these posts.

Sorry, I didn't make it clear that MN is where I first heard of leasehold houses. However, I read posters say you will still need permission to do external stuff from the freeholder (much like a leasehold flat to me- or am I wrong?). They also said, getting that permission is relatively straightforward for leasehold houses- I have no idea if that's true.

FAOD: Not only do I not want to deal with a management company in old age, I also don't want to deal with a Freeholder. So it is a freehold house I am interested to hear a maintenance budget for.

I own a 1890s detached house.

Over the last ten years, I've had to repaint it, have the guttering repaired twice, and deal with one small damp patch in a wall.

I've also had the roof relined and reslated which cost £20,000 but I knew that needed doing when I bought the house, so I'd budgeted for it.

This autumn I need to repoint the north wall, which I can do myself but is a tedious fiddly job and will take several days.

I've never needed to claim on the house insurance for anything. And it wouldn't cover maintenance/wear and tear type stuff anyway.

Get a thorough survey when you buy the house. The surveyor will comment on anything that needs work (and will produce a lengthy list of stuff - this often scares first time buyers!). But these are divided into urgent and then stuff that needs to be done within a couple or five years or will need keeping an eye on. And will give suggested costs. I then turned that into a spreadsheet of priorities with the costings and used that to plan what was needed when. We bought a fixer upper so there was a lot on the spreadsheet but it's sensible to prioritise safety and security stuff (electric rewiring, doors/windows/roof/stairs), then heating/hot water. Then more cosmetic stuff (kitchens, bathrooms, decoration). Although kitchens and bathrooms may end up as a higher priority if they're in very poor or unusable condition!

So that gives me an idea that I should anticipated replacing the flat roof in the next ten years and probably some of the double glazing in the next 5-6 years so can budget for that.

Depends on how 'handy' you are, we aren't at all, so once a year we go round room by room and make a list of snags, defects, things that need fixing. Then get a handyman in to work through as many of those as possible. It's cheaper to pay for a half day of day of labour than to get someone in multiple times for small things.

Thank you. It looks like the consensus is that I should have a 'figure' (budget) of +/- £20K for the roof depending of course on what the initial survey says- so it is reasonable and doable.

@RidingMyBike again, thank you for breaking that down in stages which is really helpful.

God, I feel like a first time buyer lol however, I did listen to wise advice when I bought my first 2 properties (done nearly at same time) and made such great purchases nearly 20 years ago which still hold true. Down to flushing the toilet during viewings to know it was in use. I did still make a small error with the boiler which had packed in so had not budgeted for its replacement (£7K incl labour), although I had budgeted and had funds to renovate the kitchen, bath and install wardrobes as soon as I moved in- it was easier to do it whilst living in it. I still remember saying a little prayer- I was young- one freezing morning- hoping the bank would to give me further finances for the boiler as it was during winter. I was so thankful when they did! In the end, it made sense installing a new boiler at the same time as new fridge, cooker, hob, washing machine and the fitted cupboards.

(I think the supplier had the option to finance the boiler which I chose but they still needed to do checks- I believe credit checks). So I will always have provision for surprises but want to plan as much as possible.

Thank you all for your contributions- I am very good with advice- and have been feeling like I have choices since your helpful posts started coming in- thank you very much. In respect of the foreign country, I will still get medical aid in a year or 2 when I visit again which I think will start costing me anything from £25 to £50 pcm.- I can carry that so I have options. But it is much better doing it not out of desperation but as a necessity when I might temporarily visit in old age anyway so I will have a peace of mind. My current travel insurance doesn't cover me when I am out of the UK for more than 30 days. This year I was gone for 5 months straight :)

How did you manage to pay £7k for a new boiler? That's the most expensive boiler I have ever heard of.

it could have been £5K but took it on credit over I think a couple of years and was sent a breakdown of the final cost with interest. I don't ever buy anything big on credit- only have mortgages- so this was a new experience for me.

I prefer paying upfront.

it was in 2005 so a long time ago, but I certainly had no spare cash left as had just bought the property with a healthy deposit and funds for the budgeted renovation.