Nobody publishes a price for this, which is reasonable, because no two houses are the same. But the absence of published prices has an unhelpful side effect: owners comparing two proposals often have no idea what they are actually comparing.
This is a description of how the work is priced, what sits inside a fee and what never does, and the four questions that make two quotations comparable.
The three models
Fixed retainer. A monthly or annual fee for a defined scope: a stated number of inspections, a maintenance calendar, vendor coordination, and reporting at a stated interval. Predictable for the owner, and it rewards the provider for preventing problems rather than attending them.
Percentage of expenditure. A fee calculated as a share of what is spent on the house. Common, easy to administer, and structurally awkward: it pays more when the house costs more. It also gives the manager an interest in the very contracts they are supposed to be scrutinising.
Project or engagement fee. A defined piece of work with a defined output — a purchase inspection, a handover verification, an audit, renovation oversight. Priced on scope and duration, not on the value of the property.
Most well-structured arrangements use the first and the third, and avoid the second.
What determines the number
Five things, in roughly this order of weight.
Complexity, not size. A technically dense house of 400 m² with a large glazed envelope, a substantial pool, generator, water treatment and irrigation takes more oversight than a straightforward house twice its size. Square metres are a poor proxy.
Occupancy pattern. A house used four weeks a year and a house used year-round generate different work, not less work. Seasonal houses need opening and closing procedures and winter inspection cycles. Occupied houses need response capacity.
Staff. A residence with resident staff requires supervision, standards, scheduling and handover discipline. A residence without them requires more direct attendance.
Distance and access. Time is the real cost in this work. A house two hours from the nearest specialist trade is not a more expensive house to own by accident.
Reporting depth. A family office that requires evidence-based periodic reporting to a defined format is asking for something more substantial than a monthly message, and it is right to.
What is almost never inside the fee
This is where most misunderstandings live. In any properly written arrangement, the following sit outside the management fee and are billed at cost:
Contractor works of any kind. Materials and equipment. Utilities, taxes and community service charges. Staff salaries and social contributions. Consumables — pool chemicals, filters, garden materials. Specialist reports where an external licence is required. Capital replacement.
If a proposal appears to include all of this in one number, the number contains a margin on the works. That is not necessarily wrong, but it should be visible, because it changes whose interest is served when a repair is specified.
The four questions that make quotations comparable
1. What exactly is the scope, expressed as frequency? “Regular inspection” is not a scope. “Twelve inspections a year against a written standard, with photographic record” is. Two proposals cannot be compared until both are stated this way.
2. Do you take any commission, margin or referral fee from contractors? Ask directly and ask for it in writing. The answer determines whether the rest of the arrangement can be trusted.
3. Who verifies the work before it is paid? If the answer is the same party that performed it, there is no verification in the arrangement, whatever it costs.
4. What do I receive, and how often? The report is the product. Ask to see a sample — anonymised — before signing anything.
The number that actually matters
Management fees are a small fraction of what a significant house costs to run. The larger numbers are always the works, and the largest are the works that were not necessary.
A pump replaced on schedule in March against a pump replaced urgently in August. A leak found in week two against a leak found in month four. A contractor quoting against a written scope against a contractor quoting against an exploration.
Which is to say: the right question is not what oversight costs. It is what the absence of it has been costing, quietly, for the last three years.
Engagements are scoped after a private residence review. Villa management, governed · Vendor management
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