Home from Home
www.block-management.com
01793 741027
Cherry Jones, the founder of the Home from Home block management (www.block-management.com), will be familiar to readers of the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership website.
It was thanks to her efforts that Bovis was persuaded to remove Countrywide property management from its sites in Swindon (and subsequently, nationally as well).
Cherry obtained the backing of local MPs, and LKP, to put pressure on Bovis to get Countrywide to hand over the control of residents’ management companies that had been stalled for years.
Cherry is an active champion for leaseholders’ rights and has attended almost every Westminster round-table meeting hosted by LKP.
Her company Home from Home, based just outside Swindon off Junction 15 of the M4, has easy access to a wide geographic area and it manages sites in Wiltshire, Gloucester, Wales, London, Bristol and Devizes. Its activities span from Cardiff to Essex.
Home From Home have been in business for more than 30 years.
Cherry says: “We have found that we are often called in to manage sites, when the last flat has been sold and the complex is then offered into residential management and the owners are unhappy with the developer’s choice of management.
“The leaseholders want their own managing agent to take over and that is when we are appointed.”
Cherry adds:
“Our success has been based on the ability to manage the flats effectively. Most management companies operate with minimal direct contact and they don’t visit the flats.
“We have often described these companies as managing telepathically. They cost a lot and don’t deliver.
“We have turned around numerous residents’ management companies and ensured that they are in the black, with healthy sinking funds.”
Home from Home is a small, focussed company.
“We still answer all our telephones, so there are no annoying automated systems and we return all messages the same day they are received and all emails within 24 hours,” says Cherry.
“All too often managing agents take on the role of looking after blocks of flats without consideration, or a sympathetic view of the very tenuous financial situation some leaseholders may find themselves in. Especially in the present climate.
“So, it is important that we listen to our customers and keep them informed. That way there no surprises with the bills that have to be paid.
“Our blocks can only run efficiently with the support and confidence of the leaseholders who employ us.”
Home From Home
29 Bath Road
Old Town
Swindon
SN1 4AS
