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beaniebear
06-04-2009, 12:09 PM
Just reading through previous posts on this forum about high community fees - mine are HIGH !!
We live on a community with 3 chalets (1 of them being mine) and 45 1 & 2 bed apartments. I moved to this urbanisation in January 2005 and commited to a communal fee of €254 per month. This fee included all our electricity, water, upkeep of the communial swimming pool which is only open 2 moths of the year and the upkeep of the communial gardens ( in total of approx 1,000 sq mts).
After living here for 4 months we had our AGM and it was agreed ( myself not included) that the residents would contribute a double payment each month (so for me €508 per month) for 12 months. These extra monies would pay for the roads within the urbanisation to be re tarmac & the street lights to be upgraded as they did not comply with the European Laws.
Bearing in mind the apartments pay between €40-€60 comm fees each per month, the 3 chalets cop a higher fee obviously as the stand on more ground (500sq mts).
In September 2006 the extra fees ceased but the normal fees increased, ours went to €304 per month and September of last year guess what another increase of 40 per cent bring our fees now to €420 per month! We had no notification of the last increase and as I was not in the country for the last AGM I was unable to attend.
We have no luxurious golf courses to maintain here only alot of residents who have not paid for years.
Myself and a few of my neighbours have been battling against these extorinate fees for some time, but to no avail. I have had my property on the market for 2 years but I feel totaly trapped as not only is the property market at a stand still but when we have had potential buyers viewing the property, as soon as the community fee are mentioned they run a mile!!
If anyone has any advice it would be greatly appreciated.