Condo Association Management Blog

Did you bother to show up at the board meeting and ask these questions? You know they have to have a meeting to approve this type of assesment.

You have to take a good look at your condo docs. Most By-Laws state that the board can impose an assessment for whatever reason and a meeting is not always required. Most "limits" have to do with the regular assessment (condo fee) and not special assessments.

You really must read your Condo documents.In Florida, a vote of all the owners('the voting rights')must be held. Usually for the vote to be valid, at least 50%+1 of the owners have to vote.  
As long as the minimum number of owners do vote, a simple majority of the votes for or against wins.

We would have shown up at the Board meeting had we known. the vote for the special assessment was in private Board members only. 
 
Our ByLaws specifically state under section for special assessments that the board cannot vote on an amount that is over 5% of the aggregate annual expenses for the fiscal year without a 50%+1 of owners agreement/vote.Believe me majority of the owners are not in agreement. I sent a letter to board members and property mangement explaining the bylaws. The response was the repairs are mandatory and have sent out bills to each owner with late fees and penalities. Several of the owners including myself had requested a meeting. We are being ignored.What is our recourse? What responsibility does the property management have in all this. Can they tag leins against our property along with late fees and penalities accumulating each month? Do we need an attorney?

Our HOA has the same problem only $500 less. I spent almost 4 years getting people on the Board to fire the Crooked Management Co./CAI (Associa). The problem...the President, a non acting Attorney refused to give up his self appointed position. He then used his legal statis to bully home owners and convince the new Board Members and new Management Co. that he knew what he was talking about. There was a Lawsuit on all buildings except 2, which were built 2 years prior. I managed to get the case and found out our HOA won almost Two Million. Three months later a Supplemental Assessment was made, only using other words to descibe it as Emergency, Special, Budget, etc. In the letter to the President from one of the Attorneys on the case, stated that there was not to be any Special Assessment on any buildings. If anything needed to be repaired, we were to use HOA insurance and then any additional funds were to be sent to the Attorney. Our Bi-Laws also state that any Assesment is not to exceed $10,000 total for the year. We are being charged $50 per month for penalties. I thought Fines are to be reasonable and Penalties can only be imposed by a Judge? The President and the Attorneys who started and won the Law-suit convinced the 4 Homeowners that showed up for Meeting to settle for $450,000? I believe they all made off with a Million and a Half? Now...the President has resigned in the middle of a term, leaving everyone hanging. HELP?????