Q: We moved into a neighborhood in Sarasota that consists of 52 houses but is considered a condominium and was billed as “maintenance-free.” We have a lot of problems.
First, everyone disagrees even over minutiae, and the board feels the need to hire a designer or some sort of expert on everything.
What appealed to us when we were in the process of buying was the “maintenance-free” aspect. Now, all the homes are being painted, and I guess maintenance-free comes with a few hiccups.
If there is rotten fascia, it is the owner’s responsibility to repair or replace it. If the sod is in poor condition, it is up to the owner to replace it. All the landscaping within 18 inches of the drip edge of the house is the owner’s responsibility. The units were built in 1979, and no one has done anything since then except mow the grass and trim the very old landscaping.
Many units have outdoor lighting that is in extremely poor condition, and now the board wants to hire some designer to come up with two choices for everyone to vote on.
My question is whether there is a way to do away with the condo setup and abolish the association. Can we just declare the homes as they are, which is “single family” and let everyone take care of their lawns and their own exteriors?
– Name withheld by request, Sarasota
A: Theoretically, the owners in your condo could organize to “terminate” the condo regime. You have to appreciate the term — termination has a certain finality to it. But in the Florida condominium law context, that is easier said than done.
Florida’s condo law dates to 1963. That means many of the earliest communities are now facing functional obsolescence. If a camel is a committee’s design of a horse, how do you get a group of unit owners, headed by a volunteer board of directors with usually little or no practical experience, to make the best decisions about preserving and improving a community?
Your 1979 condo documents have termination provisions, although they will be unworkable.
The current statute has “voluntary” termination provisions, too. (And by voluntary, I mean getting rid of the condominium form of ownership and governance by decision, as opposed to a disaster like a hurricane or structure failure, which destroys or damages the units beyond repair.)
However, as a practical matter, trying to “kill” a condo and convert it to single-family community under the circumstances you have described would be a very expensive exercise in futility. If you have neighbors arguing over “minutiae,” surely you could not organize a successful effort to change the very legal nature in which you own your unit.
I understand your concerns and sympathize with them. Many have purchased a property based upon representations that all exterior maintenance would be performed by someone else. (You never have to mow your own grass again!)
That may be true, but control of who does it, how much it costs and how the work is performed is also surrendered. That is just the nature of the beast that you embraced when you bought your unit.
My favorite (mis)representation in planned community sales is “carefree” living. Translation: “I have a problem.” “Oh, yeah? Who cares?”
I am seeing your kind of problems come up all the time. Associations, like the owners who make them up, are strapped for cash. Necessary maintenance may be deferred or ignored. The costs for repairs that used to be routinely handled and paid for by an association are now being placed on owners who may be even less able to financially handle the burden.
Is it fair that owners who contributed through their assessments to handle their neighbor’s problem to now be told that a similar problem is their own?
Florida condo law mandates that associations establish and fund reserves for certain building components, including building painting, roof replacement and pavement resurfacing, as well as for any other items for which the deferred maintenance or replacement cost exceeds $10,000.
The law permits the owners to vote each year to waive or reduce reserve funding, but I don’t recommend that, and lenders may not approve a mortgage on a unit in a condominium where reserves do not exist or are not fully funded.
Pay now or pay later. If very little exterior work has been performed since 1979, it may be time to review the documents to make sure who is responsible for what, rather than wasting time and money trying to dissolve the association.
Tamela Eady is a Florida Bar board-certified real estate attorney with more than 25 years’ experience, concentrating her practice on community association and real estate legal matters. The subjects discussed in her columns are not intended as specific legal advice to anyone and are subject to principles that may change from time to time. Questions may be modified for clarity or for brevity. Email questions for possible inclusion in a future column to tke@eadylaw.com.
