Repairs and maintenance in common areas

This content applies to Scotland only.

Housing laws vary between Scotland and England. This page applies to Scotland only. Get advice relating to England

This section is aimed at home owners who live in a flat, tenement or apartment block. It explains how you and your neighbours can work together to keep your building well maintained, and what you should do if repair work needs to be carried out to common areas such as the roof or stairs.

Working together

This page explains what common areas are and looks at how you and your neighbours can work together to maintain common areas of your building. This may help prevent the need for large, expensive repairs in the future. Read more 

Property managers and factors

You may decide that the best and most hassle-free way of keeping up with maintenance and repair work is to hire a property manager or factor to take care of it for you. In some cases, your title deeds may state that you have to hire a property manager. This page explains what managers and factors do. Read more 

Responsibility for common repairs

This page explains how you can work out who owns common areas of your building and who is responsible for their upkeep. This information should be in your title deeds. If not, the rules set out in the tenement management scheme (TMS) should be used to fill in the gaps. This page explains what the TMS is and how it works. Read more 

Decisions about common repairs

The tenement management scheme (TMS) sets out procedures flat owners need to follow when making 'scheme decisions' about maintaining and repairing common parts. These rules can be used if your title deeds don't specify how decisions should be made, or if different owners' title deeds say conflicting things. Read more 

Paying for common repairs

This page looks at issues involved in paying for maintenance and repairs to common areas, including how to divide up the costs, how to set up a maintenance account, and what to do if any owner refuses to pay up, or sells their flat without paying any outstanding repair bills. Read more 

Common insurance

If you live in a tenement or other shared building, depending on what your title do or don't deeds say you may need to take out a joint insurance policy with the other owners to cover common areas. This page looks at the kind of insurance you need. Read more 

Problems with common repairs

This section looks at what to do if you live in a tenement or other shared building and need to deal with an uncooperative owner who won't take their repairing duties seriously. You may be able to get help from the council or a mediator, or you may decide to take the matter to court. Read more