![]() ![]() Some disputes still disintegrate into lawsuits. The fights now revolve over how to execute the renovations, such as: “Is the engineer we brought in the right one? Could somebody else potentially look at our building differently? Could we have found somebody else who could say our repair should be lower?” “That’s out of their hands now,” said Harold Lewis, senior partner of Haber Law, who represents condo associations and unit owners. But no longer do boards ponder whether to proceed with repairs. Skirmishes among condo owners remain common, too. Some of his clients are already facing delays. The uptick in demand for inspections has created a shortage of qualified engineers in Florida, Main-Baillie said. ![]() Now, all 67 counties have those requirements. Before the new regulations were enacted, only Miami-Dade and Broward counties mandated that aging buildings be recertified. The laws ban condo associations from waiving reserve requirements and require properties to complete inspections by 2025.īut many condo associations will likely struggle to comply on time. Building recertification is now required 30 years after construction, or 25 years if the structure is within three miles of the coast, and every 10 years thereafter. Six of the property owners never responded to the city’s notice.Īfter the collapse, Florida lawmakers stepped in to address the issue of condo maintenance, and passed legislation in 2022 to force unit owners to act. Just one of 14 buildings in Bay Harbor had completed a 40-year recertification process due in 2020 by soon after the Surfside collapse. Take Bay Harbor Islands, a wealthy enclave just west of Surfside. It’s too much of a popularity contest,” said Greg Main-Baillie, a Colliers broker who helps associations manage construction projects.įew buildings even complete the process. These, and other issues, sometimes render condo boards fairly impotent. Frequently, members of condo associations defer taking significant action and waive levying fees to bolster reserves, leaving little savings for maintenance. ![]() Typically, one faction of residents only wants to do minimal and cosmetic upgrades and another faction, often seniors stuck on fixed incomes, could not afford extensive repairs. These battles are fairly routine among condo owners across Florida, many of whom do not want to pay for costly renovations. By then, the cost had ballooned to $15 million, averaging $110,000 per unit. Repairs got underway in 2021, only a few months before the collapse, and past the building’s recertification deadline. In 2019, the majority of the condo board resigned as it struggled to mount a response to the damning report, according to The Washington Post. An engineer who inspected the property found signs of “major structural damage” to the concrete slab below the pool deck and “abundant” cracking in the parking garage under the 13-story building.ĭespite the dire warnings, the squabbles continued. That same year, the association had begun preparations for the structure’s 40-year recertification. One complaint between the association and a resident ended in litigation, which was settled in 2018. The condo owners of the Champlain building, erected in 1981, had long fought over its maintenance. ![]()
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