lilSS wrote:
NancyOttawa wrote:
ANother thing to check into ..... how old is the unit? My building is now 22 years old and ended up needing some major work done. Although we have a very healthy "slush fund" we needed about $600,000 for the repairs required to the brick work. So on top of paying $360/month condo fees, every owner in our 111 unit building got 2 months notice to come up with an extra $3000 "special assessment fee". And they told us this 2 months before Christmas. If you didn't pay up, we were threatened with a lien to be put on our property. So maybe try and find out if there is any work that has to be fixed in the condo community and how much it may cost you extra. My mom also moved out of her condo a few years ago when my dad died, just in time to miss a $25,000 special assessment fee (about 4 months after she sold)! The new owner had to pay it and was pissed off.
RE: Special assessments...when you get your homeowners insurance, make sure that there is a provision for such. I didnt know I shouldve had this provision until I switched my provider after almost 6 years. I made sure that I now have at least $10k coverage for special assessments and it barely raised my premium. Good way to make sure that unless its really nuts, you have some coverage for such.


hmmm, maybe I'll try changing providers and see if I can get that, but I know for the issue that was with our building repairs that were required, it was becaue the builder cut corners and over 20 years water was getting behind the bricks and it started to seep into the upper units and cause major damage to dry wall and some of their floors etc so for that reason, my insurance company told me I could claim the assessment on my insurance because as far as my unit, it hadn't received any damage yet so it was considerred "preventative".  Had my unit actually been like the ones on the top two floors and had actual damage, then I may have been covered.