Home maintenance costs reach two thirds of average mortgage

The soaring cost of tradesmen, gardeners and cleaners means that running the average home is now two thirds as expensive as paying the average mortgage.

New research has found that an average of £627 is spent a month on maintenance, repairs, decorating, gardening and cleaning, compared with £898 a month on a mortgage.

The figures suggest that homeowners spend the equivalent of 3 per cent of the value of their properties maintaining and improving them each year.

The cost of tradesmen has risen sharply

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The research, which questioned more than 2,000 property owners, found that they spent an average of £7,530 a year running their homes although this increases to more than £11,000 a year for the biggest detached properties.

Many said that the costs of running a property were much higher than they expected, with two in five first-time buyers saying that they had not budgeted for home maintenance at all before they moved in.

The single biggest cost homeowners face is repair and maintenance work, both planned and emergency, such as plumbing and electrical work, as well as the installation and maintenance of appliances, such as boilers and washing machines, and interior or exterior building work. Collectively, this costs an average of £283 a month, although there were wide variations in cost depending on whether homeowners had extended or modified their home.

The Construction Industry Joint Council says that the average hourly rate for builders with a craft, such as bricklayers, is £15.34 an hour, which has risen by 40 per cent in ten years. However, this accounts mostly for those who work for big companies in the construction industry, with freelance tradespeople who work on people’s homes often charging much more.

Hudson Contract, which tracks labour costs across the building industry, says that pay rates for self-employed tradesmen hit a new high at the end of last year after rising nearly 5 per cent a year earlier. It says that the typical day rate for a freelance builder, for example, is now £400.

The rates for the most skilled tradesmen can be higher. Plumbers typically charge between £40 and £60 an hour while the hourly rate for electricians is as high as £70.

Labour costs have increased significantly since the Brexit vote and the pandemic because many construction industry workers from Europe decided to return to their home countries.

Homeowners spend more than £1,000 a year on average maintaining their garden

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The research also looked at the cost of keeping and maintaining a garden, including any emergency work such as repairing a fence. Homeowners said that they spent £87 a month on their gardens or £1,038 a year.

The average household also spent £662 a year on cleaners although this masked large variations, with detached homeowners spending much more and flat owners spending much less. There are also significant variations in what is spent on cleaners between the regions and age groups.

In London, for example, where costs are highest, independent cleaners typically now charge between £13 and £20 an hour, meaning that the cost of cleaning a family home can be as high as £80. The rates charged by cleaning agencies are even higher at between £12 and £30 an hour.

Perhaps surprisingly, the study found that younger homeowners are the most likely to have a cleaner, with a third of Generation Z having one compared with only about one in 20 baby boomers.

Jambu Palaniappan, chief executive of Checkatrade

LUCY YOUNG FOR THE TIMES

Jambu Palaniappan, the chief executive of Checkatrade, the tradesmen-sourcing website that commissioned the study, said: “The figures shine a spotlight on the costs associated with maintaining homes. While the figures may seem high, it’s important to remember that a significant building repair or new kitchen or bathroom can cost tens of thousands of pounds.”