How can leaseholders afford urgent roof repairs?

We know of a similar situation, but the leaseholders are being asked to bear the cost of replacing the roof of an adjacent building, not their own, and the costs seem so unreasonably expensive I suspect a cartel. Has anyone else experienced this?

From what you wrote you own your flat with share of freehold interest in a management company aka a Residents Management Company (RMC ). If that is so thenYou and the other flat owners wear 2 hats:

1. As £1 paid up shareholders who own the RMC with obligations to its M&A and
2. As lessees with obligations under your own leases with sc payable to the RMC acting obh of the Lessor

First: do roof repairs fall as sc under your lease so why hasn’t the roof been maintained and second: As a shareholder a report to directors about roof repairs.

As shareholders you are liable for the RMC company debts so you need to call on the directors to fulfill their fiduciary duty to the M&A available on Companies House register.

Roofs reach their end of life eventually. It’s for the flat owners to make provision for any repairs just as householders and landlords are expected to fund repairs to the property(ies) that they own.

If they can’t afford to repair the roof they should consider selling up.

You should all engage your MP. The property management company , if you have one, has been lax in not having annual roof surveys and ensuring there is a sink fund for this work. Some pressure from your MP may help.

In response to David ‘s advice, from personal experience you’ll be very lucky if your MP has a clue about long resident leases.

Yes very lucky, but worth pursuing as I can see no other option here and Nancy just might have an MP prepared to run with this,Governments seem overly concerned with tenant’s rights and need to be more concerned about leaseholders.
Property management companies should be regulated, from experience they do the absolute minimum and like so many overpaid professionals exempt themselves from any responsibility.
I

An RMC or an RTM are not external property management companies.

RMC and RTMs are owned by the leaseholders described as ‘lessee owned landlords’ and legally responsible for their own destinies.

The downside of share of freehold. The upside is leaseholders entirely control the management of the lease and the company.

It is a two sided coin. Rights and responsibilities. If you want to have all the rights that come with enfranchisement then you have to live up to the responsibilities that come with it. The populist narrative that is being peddled is that you can do away with freeholders and managing agents and that somehow the cost of running buildings disappears with them. This is disingenuous at best and pure fantasy at worst. Buildings still have to be maintained by someone and will always cost money that has to be paid by someone. There is no buck to pass. The buck lands with you.

Reply to the comment left by Kizzie at 28/04/2025 – 12:15
I believe an RMC is responsible for the maintenance of the building.

Reply to the comment left by Cider Drinker at 28/04/2025 – 10:56
That’s part of the problem. Several flats have already been listed for sale for well over 12 months, but inevitably no-one will buy with the water ingress issue outstanding. Significant work had been done pre-covid, costing almost £100k, but it was done to a low standard and did not sort out the problem. Inevitably the contractor went bust so there is now a bigger problem with far higher costs.