Charging points in the VvE garage: what needs to be arranged?

Asking for a charging point in the garage has become, for many owners, a matter of when rather than if. The number of electric cars in the Netherlands has for years grown faster than the number of charging points in existing parking garages, and within an owners' association that request quickly runs into two separate questions: is it allowed, and is it possible.

Those two questions have little to do with each other, and the second one is often underestimated. Charging point, charger, charging station: the exact term barely matters to the garage; whether the connection can handle it does.

Is it allowed: the meeting is becoming less of a hurdle

Until now, installing a charging point in the shared garage has usually required a qualified majority: typically two-thirds or three-quarters, depending on the association's own regulations. That is changing: a bill for a notification scheme is working its way through, under which an owner can have a charging point installed simply by notifying the board, without a vote of the general meeting at all. At the same time, the threshold for sustainability decisions generally is dropping from two-thirds to a simple majority. The intended start date was 29 May 2026. Check the current status of this bill for the exact conditions, since those remain just as important as the headline rule.

For a board, that shifts the conversation from "can we refuse this" to "how do we arrange this for everyone who wants it, not just whoever asked first." That second conversation isn't about approval, but about capacity.

Is it possible: the meter cupboard is the real bottleneck

Every building has a maximum connection capacity, and it was rarely designed with the assumption that a large share of the garage would charge at full power at the same time. Before an association promises a number of charging points, mapping out what the connection can actually handle is the first step, not the charging point itself.

For a garage with multiple interested owners, one shared connection with load management is usually more sensible than every owner having their own, heavier individual connection installed. A load management system dynamically distributes the available power across the connected charge points, making sure the lift and lighting get their power first, and the cars second. That often allows more charging points on an existing connection than you'd expect at first glance, and delays a costly capacity upgrade for longer. The Regional Energy Desk's explanation is a good starting point for working out what's realistic for your garage.

Subsidies cover part of the cost. The national SVVE scheme reimburses 75% of advisory costs (up to €1,500) and a fixed €100 per parking space for the basic charging infrastructure: the cabling and preparation, not the charging point itself. There's also SPRILA, offering up to €2,500 per charging point in an apartment building. Both schemes change annually, so check the current conditions right before requesting a quote.

Five things to work out in advance

• What is the building's current maximum connection capacity, and how many charge points can it support without an upgrade?
• Does the association go for one shared connection with load management, or individual connections per owner?
• What majority is still required right now under the association's own regulations, and does that change under the new notification scheme?
• Which subsidies are currently still valid, and who applies for them: the association collectively, or the owner individually?
• Who manages and maintains the charging points after installation, and how is that built into the association's budget?

The meeting is no longer the biggest obstacle, and will become even less of one under the new rules. What remains is a technical and organisational question: how many charge points fit on the existing connection, and how do you keep that handful of charging points usable for everyone who has a car for it, not just whoever happened to ask first.