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Condo Ownership
A friend recently moved into a new condo she had purchased, but soon found out that the experience was much different than her previous home ownership, when she lived in her own house, with no neighbors and no condo association rules and regulations. For her, it turned out to be a big plus, because life in her condo is free of many of the routine headaches she disliked as a homeowner. The condominium association takes care of such things as lawn maintenance, roof repairs, and painting the outside of the building, so that her life is relatively care-free compared to before, when she lived in a fixer-upper home.
But for others, condo ownership is not as much fun, because they enter into ownership without first studying the condo’s membership rules. Living in a condo can be much like apartment living, and issues of noise, parking in other people’s parking spaces, and sharing of common areas like the clubhouse can produce legal disagreements. But most of these issues are clearly spelled out in the condo association handbook. For example, if the association decides to make each condo owner pitch in to help pay for new tennis courts, and you aren’t a tennis player, you might feel cheated.
Get a copy of the by-laws and rules of the condo you are buying, and have a real estate attorney help you decipher what the legal language means. Weight the pros and cons, and then proceed with an educated perspective.
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Real Estate Investing |
