Kidderminster estate residents hit out at 'Fleecehold' bills

Residents say the maintenance payments amounted to "fleeceholds"

Residents living on a Worcestershire housing estate say they have been left in "abject misery" paying for maintenance services that are not being carried out.

Homeowners on the Stour Valley development in Kidderminster said the payments amounted to "fleeceholds".

Their service bills had also more than doubled in four years, some said.

Management company AF Partnership said it was unable to carry out the work due to current debts and the annual budget.

These "estate fees" emerge when a local council decides not to adopt areas of new housing estates, leaving the builder - or usually a third party management company - with responsibility for roads and maintaining green spaces.

The homes were built by Bovis and Taylor Wimpey with the maintenance contract now run by AF Partnership, which is the fourth firm to take on responsibility for it in four years.

About 250 homeowners are each paying between £120 and £210 a year, but grass has been left uncut and a play area has been taken out of use.

Areas of the estate had been left in a "shocking condition" one resident said

Freeholder Caroline O'Callaghan said an area outside her home had been left in a "shocking condition".

She said the grass was meant to be cut 20 times a year, but "we're lucky if they come five".

"We have no control over what they charge us and our lives are abject misery, and the law needs to be changed," she said. .

Chris, who has lived on the estate for five years, said the charge had doubled in that time.

"We've been paying for a company to come regularly, theoretically, but they would come and not do any work," she said.

"Now we're told that there's no money in the pot to pay for anybody to come, so it's all becoming very annoying. "

Homeowner Caroline Ashall said there was no way out of the payments, which are usually part of the property's deeds.

"Fleecehold is what they call it," she added.

The maintenance bills come on top of the rising cost of living.

A play area on the estate has been taken out of use

Cathy Priestley, from the Home Owners Rights Network, said she had heard "hundreds" of similar stories from residents right across the UK.

Her group, which represents more than 160,000 homes in the UK, is calling for it to be compulsory for local authorities to adopt land on any new estates.

"What this would mean is that the estates are built up to adoption standards that are much higher than the standards which are being used by the builders left to their own devices," she said.

The measures would stop "extra uncontrollable bills" she added.

In a statement, AF Partnership said all owners had a legal obligation to pay for the maintenance of the areas, but "due to current debts and the annual budget, we are at the moment unable to pay contractors to carry out the work, which the committee is aware of".

A spokesperson for the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said: "We intend to bring forward legislation so freehold homeowners who pay estate rent charges have the right to challenge management companies on unreasonable fees."