Answering Objections: I don’t use the Apartment, Pool, Lift etc. So why should I pay?
While there are many benefits to owning a property in a communal building, development or resort, there are also additional concerns. Your fellow owners and neighbors become part of your investment, almost as if they were indirect partners. They can negatively affect your investment as much as a bad business partner can affect a business.
This is why it’s essential when purchasing and owning a property with communal facilities (Lift, Carpark, Road, Corridor, Pool etc. that you properly understand the unique aspects relating to communal property ownership.
In this article I discuss how to answer one of the most common objections given to paying their communal fees.
(This article is the first in a series of on how to answer common owner payment objections).
Objection 1) I don’t use the swimming pool/lift etc. so why should I need to pay towards it!
If you have been involved in collection of the communal fee, you will have heard this objection. Below are some answers you can give to reply to this type of objection.
Your 1st Answer.
Inform them just like any other unit owner the property can be used, rented out or sold. It is that unit owner’s decision not to use the property. The committee cannot be expected to monitor how each owner use their properties and adjust their share of expenses and set the communal fee’s accordingly.
Your 2nd Answer.
Remind them while they may not get an immediate benefit from these facilities being maintained they will benefit from an increased sales valuation when they decide to sell the property on in the future. Or if they decide at a later date they do want to rent the property out, it will be more attractive with fully maintained facilities.
Your 3rd Answer
Plus at the heart of the matter that’s what the communal property regulations mandate.
Get a copy of the regulations and show them that there is no provision to allocate each owners share of the expense by how much they use that facility. Its simply not permitted under the law to charge this way even if you wanted to as the regulations require each units communal fee to be calculated equal to their share of ownership of the communal areas and facilities.
If they still object.
There are provisions in the communal property regulations to split a part of the communal building.
For example you have two separate blocks and a shared pool you may be able to split this into two, each with their own committee, budget and communal fee structure.
This is a complicated procedure requiring consultation with the land registry and a formal vote by owners, specialist expert advice should be sourced before you start this process.
And of course until complete the unit owner must contribute their full share towards the communal expense.
