The Conservative MP for North East Bedfordshire, Richard Fuller, has met with the housing minister to speak up for the thousands of people across Bedfordshire affected by unfair estate management fees.
Mr Fuller described his meeting with Micheal Gove, secretary of state for levelling up, housing and communities, on Tuesday (21 February) as “very positive”.
With each new housing development that is built in Bedford Borough, management companies are set up with the purpose of collecting estate management fees.
“Estate management fees are imposed on local residents in some new housing developments to cover the cost for upkeep of local facilities such as play areas or to keep the grass verges cut or to maintain ponds or other aspects of local landscaping,” explained Mr Fuller.
“The responsibility for these items used to pass to the local authority in many cases with the costs covered by local Council Tax.
“Now however an increasing number of residents find they are paying their Council Tax and then also paying a Service Charge on top.”
Local councillors, including Conservative Cllr Jim Weir in Great Denham and Lib Dem candidate Leigh Coombs, who is also vice chair of the New Cardington Residents’ Association, have undertaken considerable work with their constituents to gather evidence.
Issues include lack of transparency, late-issued invoices, conflict of interest as well as the sheer quantity of management companies that exist.
In one instance highlighted by Cllr Weir, residents were paying £21,888 per year to their management company. When they received their annual invoice, just £2,174 related to work done.
The remaining £19,714 relates to overheads, reserves and management fees.
“9.9% relates to maintenance and a whopping 90.1% to all the rest,” said Cllr Weir.
“Residents have had enough and we as a Unitary Authority have to lobby harder and longer to pressure Ministers which will give more weight to Richard’s efforts.”
Cllr Weir is calling on Bedford Borough Council to fully back his campaign for management fee reform, which is also supported by the Bedford Independent.
You can sign Cllr Weir’s petition for reform here.
“The bewildering array of different companies that manage really quite small areas of larger developments adds to the general confusion for residents,” said Mr Fuller.
As reported in the Bedford Independent last year, some Great Denham residents said maintenance costs of over £1,000 were charged per external light.
Read: Great Denham residents face ‘mind-boggling’ maintenance costs of £1,257 per light
“I am pleased that Richard [Fuller] got the chance to ask the Planning & Housing Minister to tackle this inequitable and unfair system,” said Cllr Weir.
“I have literally hundreds of examples of how ludicrous the charges are to residents, and I continue to try to engage with the developers who appoint these agents.”
Leigh Coombs, Lib Dem candidate and vice chair of the New Cardington Residents Association said that householders have waited long enough.
“We need Richard Fuller to hurry up as our government has sat on this issue for years,” he told the Bedford Independent.
“We have been “waiting for parliamentary time to allow” for years. Homeowners are being ripped off and the government are sitting on this and not doing anything to help.
“In Shortstown we are expecting 250 homes on the DVSA site and 1,000 or so on the college farm proposed site. That’s over 1250 families who are lined up to be ripped off, they will pay stamp duty (a tax on already taxed money) and then the government will sit back and watch RMG and the like fleece them. Fleecehold! We need national urgent action..now.”
The Bedford Independent is proud to support this campaign. It is evident that reform of the system is needed and we hope to help local people get their voices heard in this debate in any way we can.
