If you buy a tenement flat, you're buying a share in looking after the whole building. The Tenements (Scotland) Act 2004 sets the default rules where the title deeds don't cover something. Here are the parts buyers most often ask about, straight from the Act's Tenement Management Scheme (schedule 1).
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What counts as shared ("scheme property")
Unless the titles say otherwise, the scheme covers parts owned in common, parts the titles make two or more owners maintain, and these parts of the building:
- the ground it's built on and its foundations
- its external walls
- its roof, including the rafters or other structure supporting it
- the tenement's part of any gable wall shared with another building
- any load-bearing wall, beam or column
The scheme excludes an extension that's part of only one flat, any door, window, skylight, vent or other opening that serves only one flat, and any chimney stack or flue.
How decisions are made
Under the default scheme, each flat gets one vote and a decision is made by a majority of all the votes allocated. An owner who wants to call a meeting must give the others at least 48 hours' notice. Any owner can instruct emergency work needed to prevent damage or in the interests of health or safety.
How costs are split
For the shared parts listed above, costs are usually split equally between the flats. But if the largest flat is more than one and a half times the floor area of the smallest, each owner pays in proportion to their flat's floor area. If owners are asked to put money up front, any deposit over £100 has to be requested by written notice and paid into a maintenance account.
Repair bills from before you bought
This is the one to ask your solicitor about. Section 12 of the Act says a new owner can be liable, alongside the former owner, for some repair costs agreed before they bought. For maintenance or work other than local authority work, that only applies if a "notice of potential liability for costs" was registered against the flat at least 14 days before you acquired it. If you do pay, you can recover the amount from the former owner.
Help from the council
The council's Shared Repairs Service gives private owners free advice on organising shared repairs. See our shared repairs guide for what it offers.
Not legal advice. This is a plain-English summary of official sources to help you know what to ask. Every property is different, so check the details with your solicitor, surveyor or the council before you rely on it.
Related
Buying a flat in Edinburgh: the checklist · Shared repairs · Statutory repair notices · Browse postcode areas · Search a street
Sources (checked 2026-11-06): Tenements (Scotland) Act 2004 · Schedule 1: Tenement Management Scheme · Section 12: liability of new owners · Council: shared repairs. Summaries are our wording; the council's pages are authoritative.