The external appearance of any building is the first thing everyone sees. If you appoint Watsons as your managing agent, to take care of your property, then it is our role to ensure that grounds and gardens are well maintained and those weeds are kept at bay.
Whether it’s a small private courtyard or extensive grounds many of the properties we manage have some outside space that needs to be maintained. This can include grass cutting, hedge trimming, pruning and planting. As well as creating a pleasant environment for residents and visitors this work can be essential in ensuring that nearby trees don’t undermine the structure of the building or that car parking spaces aren’t overgrown by hedges. There is nothing worse than returning home to see litter or weeds in the grounds and borders as well as flowerbeds and overgrown areas of lawn.
As an experienced managing agent, gardening and grounds maintenance is not always as straightforward a process as it seems – there are laws relating to the times when hedges can be cut due to nesting birds, periods of extreme growth when grass is cut regularly yet warm weather and generous showers will undo the good work done by our contractors and legal compliance on spray certification relating to gardeners or other professionals who will be using pesticides (weedkillers, insecticides or fungicides) in your garden or on your land. Tree surgery and pruning is also a specialist task that requires assessments in advance of completing works and does have health and safety implications for residents and passing members of the public.
Over the course of a year we deal with a myriad of small maintenance jobs to keep the developments we manage in good shape. From changing light bulbs in communal halls, to fixing bin store doors, from arranging for loose roof tiles to be fixed to unblocking drains. We take a pro-active approach to identifying and fixing small problems before they become big issues. As well as our regular property inspections each block has a dedicated property manager, a 24/7 customer contact centre and email address that leaseholders and residents can use to report maintenance problems as well as our resident portal which is being rolled out across our sites in East Anglia. Details of how to contact us by email and phone are displayed in all communal halls that have the space – Norwich 01603 226500, Kings Lynn 01553 603020, Ipswich 01473 358202, Cambridge 01223 656525.
Our approach is to use reliable and cost effective local tradesman to carry out routine maintenance work. We are very aware of the need to manage maintenance budgets carefully and we will always obtain at least two quotes and consult with Directors about expenditure over a threshold you can set for us.
The regular maintenance of grounds, car parking areas and flowerbeds, is simplistic providing a quality contractor is used and we ensure that regular inspections are carried out to ensure this matter is attended to correctly. We instigate a regular up keep programme during all seasons and carefully plans budgets to keep service charges at an affordable level. We regularly inspect the property to ensure quality control and we monitor the progress of the contract. If you would like to discuss your grounds maintenance or any issues regarding the services we provide; don’t hesitate to call us.
