Subscribe to Blog

Your email:

Follow Us

Looking for answers?

condo association blogCan't find the answer you're looking for?  Ask your question here and we'll post it in our blog.

Browse by Topic

Most Popular Posts

Condo Association Management Blog

Current Articles | RSS Feed RSS Feed

Newly merged condo association tries to retro-assess its owners

Posted on Tue, Nov 30, 2010 @ 06:56 AM
  
  
  
  
  
Add to delicious  delicious  
  
My husband and I and four other groups make up 33% of a professional condominium association. The remaining 67% is owned by the developer. There was a merge 20 months ago and now the "new" majority has decided to go back 6-10 years and collect for common areas assessments that for 33 years were never passed on to us. Can they are anyone else for that matter threaten to take you to court for charges that you were never billed for (and still haven't been billed for them) and after 20 months of threaten to put liens on our practices. Can they do this! We have retained legal counsel for this matter, however, they are sitting on their hands. I think they are intimidated by who the 67% represents. Can you give me some idea if they can go back 6-10 years and bill us for something that we never knew we owed. Please help...this has become a nightmare...they are holding this over our head and continue to threaten us with liens and forcing us to sell them back our units to mitigate what "they" think we owe.
Tags: , ,

Comments

I am not a lawyer but my guess is that if they have threatened you for 20 months and haven't taken legal action then there just blowing smoke.  
 
You state you have legal representation. What does your lawyer say? 
Posted @ Tuesday, November 30, 2010 8:51 AM by Victor
Most states have some version of a condominium Act. That act and your bylaws contain requirements for both the developer and the association to meet in transitioning from developer control to association control. Revoew your bylaws ans tour state law to ascertain the correct process you and the developer musrt adhere to. If your hired legal council is not tgaking action you should terminate his services. But before hiring a replacement review your documents. In your case I think the developer is trying to saddle the association with costs he should bear and is relying on scare tactics and your associations lack of understanding of your rights in this matter.
Posted @ Tuesday, November 30, 2010 9:03 AM by Charles Adler
This is a medical professional building in Michigan. The developer which is now 67% owned by the hospital of which we have merge in the past 2 years. Previously the original hospital owner had paid all fees excluding our mortgages and utilities for our individual spaces. Now since the merge with another hospital, they are the ones trying to collect all the monies from the past 6-10 years paid by the previous hospital/owner/developer. We have recently been told that the new hospital ownership will consider buying our units back...but only to mitigate what they think we owe for the past 6 years. Our team of attorneys have stated that it is illegal for them to try and collect for the past 6 years, however they haven't pressed our group of doctors to do anything. So, my feeling is...if it were illegal why aren't they doing something about it and why doesn't the other side know this? I know within our practice, if we haven't billed a client for services for over 6 years that the charges are "not collectable". It is illegal for us to try and collect. Why would that not apply here? Any insight would be appreciated. At this point my husband are considering going to another attorney. However, when this matter began the group of doctors involved thought it would be wise to team up and use the same attorney. It sounded good at the time, but we just don't see anything happening.
Posted @ Wednesday, December 15, 2010 8:37 AM by tj
Post Comment
Name
 *
Email
 *
Website (optional)
Comment
 *

Allowed tags: <a> link, <b> bold, <i> italics