Council flat leaseholders say they are planning to band together to fight “crazy” renovation costs.

Letters were sent last year to Enfield leaseholders, telling them of planned work, but with no hint of cost or timeframe.

The work was then revealed in February to be £4 million work on 16 properties across the borough, with at least £20,000 in costs piled on the tenants.

Enfield Council say leaseholders signed a contract agreeing to pay for any essential maintenance work needed.

Recently residents in Bycullah Road came forward, but now the 18 owners of flats in Parsonage Lane say they are unhappy with Enfield Council’s plans.

Julia Cousins has lived in Parsonage Lane since November 2014, with husband Ian and their three young girls.

Both were made redundant last year and have now been asked for £22,000, to be paid back over two years with no interest, at a cost of £900 per month.

Mrs Cousins says she has spoken to some neighbours who have lived there for 30 years and says no major renovation work has been done until now.

She said: “It is disturbing, suddenly everything is up in the air. We have a pretty tight financial situation as it is, being first time buyers and having both recently lost our jobs.

“They did say there would be some work, but no estimate was given until the bill arrived. I expected up to 10 grand, but nothing like this.

“There are people selling up, moving out, it is just awful, we hardly had the perfect life anyway and now it is worse.

“I can understand why they have to do the work, it is health and safety, but in such a tight timeframe there is no hope of getting the money, it’s crazy.”

Michelle Wood, 51, says her parents, Ralph and Winnie, have lived in Parsonage Lane since 1968 when the building was first completed as council flats and were among the first to buy it as their own home.

Now they face losing the home Ms Wood grew up in, as they have a works bill of almost £21,000.

Ms Wood says residents are sending a letter to Enfield North MP Joan Ryan, and are joining forces with Bycullah Road to get the council to back down.

She said: “It is a highly strange method of costing, the council appear to have railroaded everyone.

“If you can’t afford it, as the saying goes, then they will collect upon death – it’s shocking.

“You look at the state of the flats, the residents have always kept it tidy but there has been no council input until now, they have let the leaseholders down.”

Council spokesperson Andrew Golder said: “Leaseholders know when they purchase a property that they are financially responsible for repair and upgrade works to the blocks within which their properties reside.

“While we always seek to minimise the cost to leaseholders when works are carried out, we have a legal obligation to make sure that the properties we manage are well maintained and in a good state of repair, this benefits both leaseholders – who in the vast majority of cases will have bought their former council property at a significantly reduced rate - and council tenants.

“In this case we gave leaseholder almost a year’s notice that work was due to start and gave them a series of mechanisms through which they could contact us if they had questions.”