MORE than half a million people are now living in apartment blocks, duplexes and houses within complexes, but they have fewer rights than somebody buying a Euro30 kettle.

One of the biggest problems is the lack of understanding and information of what's involved when you buy into a multi-unit development.

A lot of people don't know what a management company is; they don't recognise it as their company. We believe management companies, which are really grown-up residents' associations, should be renamed the Owner's Company.

Many people think the problem is that they have to pay service charges, but that's not the problem. Owners should pay service charges because living in a complex is very different to living in a traditional house. In your own house you have complete control over when and what you repair.

Living in a complex and sharing with other people, however, means you've got to communally get money together to pay for the upkeep of the common areas and to pay for the roof or lifts which will need to be repaired in 10 or 20 years' time. So service charges are an essential part of communal living.

The problem is that the service charges and management companies are often not transparent. People should know how they are made up, they should have a voice in them and unless the developer hands over control of that complex to the management company, residents don't really have a voice.

What we found in our research, is that developers have been extremely slow in a lot of instances to hand full control of the complex over to the owners. As a result, owners, through the management companies have been unable to make their own decisions as to who they employ as the property management agent and to what the service charges or what the reserve fund should be.

This means some people are overpaying service charges, some are underpaying and some may have stopped paying. Once people stop paying service charges then the whole thing goes up the Swanee. There's no money to do maintenance and the upkeep and quality of the building goes down and the value of the properties go down too.

The important thing about service charges is that they are reasonable and they deliver good value for money. And unless you have full control over the management company, it is very dif"cult to ensure that. In general the developer appoints the property management agent and until you get the developer out of the picture, you can't appoint your own property management agent.

But changing the current situation will take time and that is the value hopefully, of the forum which I propose to chair. We can make changes now that don't require legislation. We can provide prospective buyers and owners with information on the managment company such as the accounts of the company and information on the reserve fund.

Many owners currently have inadequate leases, but there is no legal reason for not having a standard lease.

However, all these changes require co-operation from people in the property industry and that is why we need to have a forum. So that all the interested parties can get together and work out a solution for the short-term.

For more information see www. consumerconnect. ie