As you arrive home to your block and look up, are you thinking it could do with freshening up, a lick of paint to the flaky windows and a bit of TLC? It sounds as if you might be in line for the next external redecoration project.

In many buildings the lease dictates a frequency for such works while in others it may be more arbitrary, stating something along the lines of ’as often as is necessary’. The generally accepted frequency for most buildings is between five to seven years.