Condominium Boards Abuse

Holy moly….it does sound like a reality show. First thing first, always try to think with a clear mind. I know in this situation it can be hard when you have adults acting like their 3; however, at the end of the day, it’s business, which is keeping the building financially & physically sound.

Did you say you were/are the President? If so, demand that the manangement company put a Board member on the bank account. Better yet, fire them. The management company is not managing their money & property, they are managing yours so they should have what’s best for the building in mind, which doesn’t seem they have.

From your original post, it doesn’t sound like condominium board abuse, but nepotism, which is worst because idiots tend to let other idiots control.

I’m sorry but I don’t have much else to say. Good luck.

I was running the homeowner association before we got over the condo board, To start over the negotiation with the sponsor about finishing the building, Because we start implementing the by-laws by telling people they were not suppose to take over the common areas for themselves, putting planters in by their apartment doors or filling the common roof deck with their own benches and barbecues… I even told the V-President at that time (I was the President) the need of removing all personal property for common areas including his own and I explained that otherwise the building will become a Wild West, the one that has became today, These same people started to tell people that I was pushy and I was going to make people to spend a lot of money on the building…
I stepped back and let them to take over the new condo board without any interference. My mistake! I have ran other condo board in my previous condos and never encountered anything quite close to this.
We had a management company, that mismanaged our money and let the sponsor not to pay for stuff and used our capital funds in it totality, then stealing what was left during the first months of the present condo board in place. All homeowners ranted about the need to get a new management company and after five months of fighting, we got the one we have now, but the same history happened all over again, we are not even in control of our own Bank account, And even as of last months nobody from the board was a signer on the management company bank accnt.
At the last meeting, the president of the board stepped down and by pressure of the homeowners who assisted the meeting, the board was pressed to appoint me as president.
Then the assistant secretary (who happened to be a lawyer) who wasn’t present at this meeting, distorted everything and told everyone that the board understood and accepted me as a honorary member to deal with some issues and to serve as liason between the board and homeowners. This has became a reality show, But a this point I don’t even care who is in the board but this people, who are just destroying our property, physically and financially. There are about 18 homeowners out the 32 units this building have in total, 5 are from the board and 1 is best friend with the president, so she is allowed to decorated the windows facing the street (what violates the offering plan). # homeowners are never seen or are willing to participate in any meeting or otherwise. But 8 of us share the same opinion and worry, but by percentage we don’t represent any majority. the other 14 units are still in the hands of the sponsor creditor (hard lender guy who has so far 10 units) and some of the sponsor’s partners who still have the other 4 units.
Do you think there is any solution to all this?

Thank you so much for your insight…We are suing the sponsor for unfinished stuff and for other stuff that was found by an engineering company we hired last year, bringing the cost of repair to almost $3000000 (three millions).
Half of the residents are dissatisfied, the trick is the by-laws calls for 50% of vote for elections,since the sponsor has about 40% of the apartments we cannot call for new elections. We got the amount of people but not the percentage.
Our attorney was hired last year to negotiate with sponsor and bring our case to the AG office (we already paid about $7500), the condo board has neglected us so much that next month is the end of the 2nd year warranties and this month is when the are moving like crazy people to collect all loose ends to put this together for the lawyer, but we had the engineering survey back in May 2009 to give it to our lawyer and the sponsor and they wasted all this time. In that time, the sponsor filed for bankruptcy and transfered (foreclosed) most of the apartments to a hard lender guy (10 apartments).
Our building is filthy and abandoned, people who service our building take advantage of this situation and don’t do good service or repair.
The “new” president of the board put his apartment on the market as of 3 weeks ago, which make no sense to me to have someone like him with not interest on the future of our building, in charge.

I have a few questions for you:

1. Do you have a problem with the building being self-served? If so, does any other resident share that concern?

2. Are the board members taking up a lot of square footage to store their bikes? If so, does any other resident share that concern?

3. What financial items aren’t being disclosed by the Board? The Condominium Declaration is the bible for the building. Read it thoroughly. What does it say about financial items being disclosed? Also, since a condo operates like a corporation (similiar, but not exactly the same, to a coop), financial items have to be disclosed.

4. Regarding the unfinished work by the developer, do you know how much it would cost to finish the work that has to be done? It may (I said it may) be cheaper to hire a GC (especially in this market with construction costs so low) to finish the job instead of hiring an attorney.

I think a GC needs to come out & give the Board a quote. Lawyers make their money bu charging for stuff that doesn’t even seem that much. For example, sending a letter to each resident in the building, $600; attending Board meetings, $400; court appearances, $1500. This is already $2500. Imagine that amount times 12, which is $30,000!

Honestly, from managing a building that was also suing the developer, the situation is only going to get uglier. It seems like half of the residents don’t like the current Board members. What is the procedure in the condo dec on overthrowing the Board? Has anyone suggested that?

I don’t think you should move. As long as no one is interfering with your four walls, just try to remain sane.

Finally, no Boards (condo or coop) cannot abuse homeowners.