[xoxox]

Weekly price drops around here. Heavyhanded-one-size legislation ruining lives for a lot of condo owners.

[Red Badger]

Salt water intrusion into reinforced concrete degrades the structure over time. The rebar begins to rust, then the rust expands and cracks the concrete until eventually it cannot withstand the load pressure and the building collapses. Time scale: 50 years approximately. Depends on proximity to the ocean. This also applies to bridges and other infrastructure........

It is a real problem.

[Brian Griffin]

“Weekly price drops around here. Heavyhanded-one-size legislation ruining lives for a lot of condo owners.”

A few rich guys will get to buy prime building land cheap.

[Alberta's Child]

It's one of the underlying flaws of living in a condominium. I would steer clear of it at all costs.

Here is how a condo association typically works:

1. Nobody wants to spend any money on the common elements.

2. When something inevitably goes wrong, everyone suddenly gets outraged and points fingers at the "negligent" condo board for failing to make repairs.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

I’m sure it’s a race to the bottom on price for 30+ year old condos. When there are no owners left and no buyers, the buildings will become worthless and will get torn down.

[chickenlips]

Highrise condos will be like EV’s where no one wants an old one. The condos in the two new highrises going up near me, right on the bay, are over 97% sold and they start at $3m. They sold fast, too.

[Rockingham]

There is nothing wrong with the legislation. For alert condo owners, building integrity and repair reserves have been a concern for many years.

In essence, current condo owners have an incentive not to pay toward reserves for condo repairs and updates, leaving that cost to later owners and the years to come. Eventually though, repairs have to be made, at ruinous cost if delayed and a danger to life and limb is not made in a timely and complete enough manner.

As a matter of public policy, Florida dodged the issue for many years by permitting local governments to adopt weaker building codes and requirements for condo structural inspection and repairs. A spurt of hurricanes though exposed this as a dangerous folly, then the June 2021 collapse of the 12 story Champlain Towers South beachfront condominium the Miami suburb of Surfside caused the deaths of 98 people.

The legislation being criticized simply requires proper inspections of condos for structural integrity and adequate reserves for repairs. The alternative is to let hurricanes wreck condos and the passage of time bring condos to deadly ruin.

Does this impair the market value of older condos? Not really. The Surfside condo collapse was too spectacular to ignore and the value of older condos suffered. Fortunately, the rising value of land near the seashore makes it possible for clever condo associations to borrow for repairs in order to stretch out payments.

In addition, developers are hungry to buy up older condo buildings for tear down and new construction. This requires at least a vote by the condo owners. Some condo owners do well, while others are aggrieved at losing their home. Eventually, that condo conflict will also require legislative intervention, with compromises that inevitably leave some pleased and others angry.