Cyprus Property Forum for Buyers, Sellers & Investors

Hi
We are the owners of an apartment in a small complex in the Larnaca district. The complex consists of 18 apartments on 2 floors and 6 town houses. One house adjoins the apartment block.
We have seen many articles about the apportionment of common costs, and, in general, our owners agree that the costs of maintaining the swimming pool and common areas, such as the garden, should be fairly apportioned. We have also seen articles about insuring jointly owned buildings but these seem to only apply to apartment blocks. Some of the house owners do not think they should contribute to the cost of cleaning the apartment block stairwells and corridors as they have no use of them. Also, they do not think they should pay for the insurance of the apartment block as their only "common" property (apart from the swimming pool area) is the wall between each house. (Each house has two separate entrances and private car parking space).

Can you help in clarifying the position please?

John G
Larnaca

Hi John and welcome to the forum,

The apportionment of management costs is based on the relative sizes of the properties. So a 80m2 apartment will pay half as much as a 160m2 house - and everyone needs to contribute towards the costs regardless of whether they made use of the common areas or common facilities.

The developer will (should) have registered the complex as being under joint ownership - and the Land Registry may have details of how the charges were proportioned when the building was registered.

But it could be the case that the apartments have been registered as one complex - and the town houses registered as another (in which case the management costs associated with the apartments and the town houses will be independent of each other). But the only way of finding this out is by visiting the Land Registry.

You can also download an authorised English translation of the law of this subject from http://www.cyprus-property-buyers.com/f ... gs-law.pdf

Regards,

Hi Nigel.
I am new to the forum but I am already finding it a great resource for researching various issues regarding property in Cyprus.
I live in a 2 bed apartment in Paphos in complex of some 90 units. The complex is just 3 years old and my problem is that when it comes to paying common expenses each year the developer simply sends out an e-mail to each owner with the total amount due and no breakdown whatsoever.
When challenged on this , the matter is ignored. I am also aware that we do not have a sinking fund which is a matter of great concern.
My question is
Is it legal for the Developer to with hold such information?
What rights as Owners do we have when it comes to having input into the Management Company.

Regards
Eoin

Hi Eoin,

I'm afraid this is a common problem. The developer should be providing you with a detailed breakdown of the expenses, but virtually none of them do.

If a sufficient number of you on the development wish to do so, you can set up a Management Committee and take over the day-to-day management of the complex. You can see how to go about this in the law on the subject that you can download from http://www.cyprus-property-buyers.com/r ... nloads.htm and there are a couple of articles in my magazine that will also help:

Managing Cyprus apartments and building complexes by Louise Zambartas at http://www.news.cyprus-property-buyers. ... /id=003397

Insurance of Cyprus apartments & building complexes by Miltiades Miltiadou at http://www.news.cyprus-property-buyers. ... /id=003525

I must stress that this is not a task to be taken on lightly. There are many examples of people not paying - particularly those who live abroad. And their number of non-payers has increased as a result of the financial conditions.

Regards,

Nigel Thank you so much for your advice on this. Just again to say that both the forum and the Cyprus News and your expertise is such a valuable source of information.

Regards
Eoin

You're welcome Eoin - I hope you manage to sort things out.

Regards,