5 frequently asked questions for home maintenance companies

Martynas Žibūda, Development Director of UAB “Eika”, identifies 5 main questions for home maintenance companies that should be relevant to residents.

According to the representative of “Eika”, in order to answer the question of why an apartment building management company is needed, it is first necessary to understand that one’s own apartment and common areas (elevator, staircase, basement) are two different spaces. The latter are used by all residents of the apartment building, which means that they wear out faster and require constant maintenance.

Secondly, maintenance of common areas is not limited to cleaning the staircase once a week and replacing a burnt-out light bulb. “An apartment building is a complex structural organism, therefore its maintenance requires specific technical, accounting and legal knowledge, which only an apartment building administrator can provide,” says M. Žibūda.

In addition, the administration company and its appointed personal apartment building manager must react and take action very quickly to the problem that has arisen, and be available at any time, because the safety of residents and their property often depends on it. Therefore, promptness in the event of an unforeseen emergency (power outage, stuck stairwell door, or gas leak) is an integral part of the service for which apartment building residents pay fees to the building maintenance company.

Residents who have questions about the amount of taxes should always have the opportunity to contact the administrator. The administrator has an accurate and correct description of the common areas of the building and can accurately answer all questions related to payments for the maintenance of the building.

“A clearly drawn up description of a common use object should indicate what work was carried out in individual parts of the building and engineering systems and how the fees for this work were distributed. This description ensures that payments are calculated proportionally and fairly, for example, fees for elevator repairs are distributed to a specific staircase, and not to the entire building,” says M. Žibūda, a representative of “Eika”.

Before hiring an apartment building management company, residents should be aware that fees for lighting and cleaning common areas, operation of heating networks, repair work, elevator maintenance, and garbage removal will be calculated not based on the number of people living in the apartment, but on the area of ​​the housing.

Typically, the maintenance company assigns a personal administrator to each apartment building, whose contacts are posted on the stairwell noticeboard. Some companies set specific days of the week and hours when the administrator can be contacted. However, companies that responsibly assess their activities, according to M. Žibūda, should create the most favorable conditions for communication.

One of them is self-service. Some companies offer residents a website where they can find all the necessary and useful information about the apartment building, related works, and send inquiries with questions to the building administrator at any time of the day.

“A company focused on customer expectations provides annual plans, reports on completed work, lists of planned work, and tax statements on its self-service website. This is a convenient tool not only for residents, who do not need to call the maintenance company every time an urgent question arises, but also for the administrator, who saves time,” says a representative of the company “Eika”.

It’s easy to notice a newly installed light bulb or a cleaned staircase, but the management company performs many tasks that residents usually don’t notice and therefore cannot assess their quality. For example, inspecting all the house’s structures (walls, pipe system, roof) after the end of winter, regular maintenance of common systems, etc.

In such cases, the maintenance company must provide information about completed and planned work in the simplest possible form at least once a month. Typically, this information reaches the residents of the apartment building during meetings or is available online.

Using the website, residents can track what specific works have already been completed, what their scope and cost are, who the contractor was, and also get acquainted with the planned works. In addition, the online self-service website provides the opportunity to pay bills for services provided and see a breakdown of each month’s payments.

Many disputes between residents and the administrator arise because the latter, when carrying out their activities, makes decisions without consulting the residents. Such a practice, according to apartment building maintenance specialists, is unacceptable and should not be tolerated.

M. Žibūda states that a reliable management company should give residents the right to participate in making decisions that are important for the entire apartment building. For example, regarding building renovation or parking lot repair work, meetings or surveys of all residents should be organized, during which the owner of each apartment could express his opinion on the necessity or costs of future work. Decisions made by voting are legal if they are approved by more than half of all owners of the premises.

Founded in 1992, the company “Eika” is one of the largest real estate development and construction groups in Lithuania, successfully developing residential, commercial, public and other purpose building projects, creating a new quality of life and work. The company has already built more than 3,750 apartments and 320 thousand square meters of buildings. “Eika” has been awarded many times as the best real estate developer in Lithuania, and the company’s projects “Santariškių namai” and “Eika namai Pilaitė” have also become the best in Lithuania.

More information:
Raimonda Janusonytė
Marketing and Communications Manager
Phone: +370 5 2045 809
Email: [email protected]