Price of poor building maintenance

• 11 February, 26

Building management problems could slash the value of an apartment by as much as 20%, due to the significant depreciation that the lack of maintenance and repairs can generate, according to a study carried out by Billys, a Greek platform for managing blocks of flats.

The study showed that failing to address many small problems in the proper maintenance of residential buildings can ultimately cause significant financial damage to owners.

The most typical example is the absence of a functional elevator in multi-story buildings. In such a case, apartments, especially those located on the highest floors, suffer a decrease in the objective value up to 10%, a percentage that increases further when their commercial value is taken into account. Another example is apartments located on the top floor of a building, where the other tenants refuse to contribute to the costs of insulating the roof. This causes humidity issues and costly damage in the long run.

According to Panos Charalambopoulos, chairman of RICS Greece Valuation Professional Group, the difference in the value of two similar apartments can exceed 10-20% when they belong to buildings with different levels of maintenance, while the time a sale takes gets longer for the poorly maintained property.

Cre: Ekathimerini