Loans For Balcony Repairs At Les Quennevais Park?

The new Housing and Communities Minister has proposed loaning money to people living in the Les Quennevais Park flats who need their balconies repairing.

Up to £600,000 would be available between them from the '99-year Leaseholders Fund'. £762,000 is in it.

The flats were sold on a 99-year leasehold basis in 1964.

Defects were found on several balconies in blocks A to H of the building, which came from using precast, hollow concrete beams for the structure.

The weather conditions over the years has caused the beams to deteriorate.

The amount of money to individual homeowners would depend on the size of the property - with at least £6,700 for a one-bed flat and at least £14 thousand for a three-bed.

The loan would last for up to ten years with an interest rate of 2% a year. Households would only be eligible for a loan if they earn less than £60,000 a year.

The government says initial expressions of interest from the homeowners indicate that up to £450,000 worth of loans would be needed.

Housing and Communities Minister Deputy Russell Labey says the States should help residents with the cost of repairs because the flats were built with a fundamental defect that should have been avoided.

"It is not anticipated that the full amount of funding allocated within the 99-Year Leaseholders Fund will be used as some owners will have access to their own sources of funding to enable the repairs to be carried out or will not meet the qualifying criteria for the loan scheme.

The loans will be managed by the Treasury and Exchequer Investment Management Team as part of their day-to-day activity. On the basis that all loans are repaid in full, the 99-Year Leaseholders Fund will be fully repaid at the end of the 10-year period."

The proposition is due to be debated on 20 April.

"Given that the Government of Jersey originally commissioned these flats, it is only fair that we ensure residents have the ability to remedy the defect.

"Given how much time has passed since the flats were constructed, we can’t tell whether hollow beams were installed by accident or by design and, after such a long length of time, any investigation into how it happened would be costly and the outcome uncertain. 

"What we do know is that this mistake is leading the balconies to deteriorate over time. These defects do not pose an immediate risk to residents, but they do need to be amended so that the buildings meet modern building regulations, and this proposition will ensure that residents who might not be able to obtain a loan from traditional lenders can still fund the repairs."