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Article
Courtesy of The Florida Phoenix
By Christine Sexton
Published January 18, 2025
One of the top Republicans who has worked on condominium
laws said Tuesday that Florida’s condo crisis has been a long simmering
problem and is not just the result of legislation passed in the aftermath of
the 2021 Surfside building collapse that left 98 people dead.
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Senate Regulated
Industries Chair Jennifer Bradley delivered that message
during the committee’s first meeting for 2025, which
featured a panel session with attorneys, real estate people,
architects, and engineers operating in Florida’s condo
market. “This is
not a new crisis, this is a crisis that has existed,”
Bradley said. “Surfisde pulled back the curtain on that
crisis. It’s a reality that no one wanted to exist but it
was certainly one that the system undeniably allowed to
exist.”
Experts who appeared before legislators on Tuesday marked
the first step of reexamining the situation amid growing
pressure from condo owners and Gov. Ron DeSantis to revisit
the laws passed after the Surfside collapse. Those laws have
led to a spike in condominium assessments.
But Bradley argued that condominium association boards have
long been underfunded and that some buildings have not been
maintained or inspected. She said that 65 of Florida’s 67
counties did not require any type of inspections for
condominiums before the Surfside collapse. She pointed out
that when condo owners purchase their dwellings, they become
shareowners in the entire building, |
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The disaster scene in Surfside.
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Following Surfside, the Florida Legislature required
“milestone inspections” for condos and cooperative buildings that are 25 or
30 years of age, depending on their proximity to water, with three or more
floors in height and for any structural defects. Associations were required
to conduct structural integrity reserves studies (SIRS), evaluating the
buildings’ condition and future maintenance needs.
A wallop
The combination of the milestone inspection and SIRS have packed a wallop
with condo owners in the form of skyrocketing homeowners’ association
special assessments to cover repairs to existing structural damage and to
also ensure reserves needed to maintain the condominium in the future.
DeSantis has called the Legislature into a special session to address
immigration and other issues, including condominium safety regulations and
election law changes, in a special session that is scheduled to start on
Jan. 27.
In his proclamation, DeSantis said, “Florida condominium market continues to
face challenges including soaring costs related to assessments, repairs, and
inspections,” and that it is necessary “for the Legislature to address these
challenges to ensure that Florida residents can continue to afford to live
in their homes.”
But the Legislature has rejected his call to meet in special session, noting
in part that “condominium safety and ballot initiatives proposing
constitutional amendments are complex subjects and should be considered
during the regular session, not a truncated special session.”
What is fully funded
Matt Kuisle, regional executive director of Reserve Advisors, who was
invited to participate in the panel, told senators that there is some
confusion in the SIRS requirement over what “fully funded” means — whether
it’s the amount needed to cover a repair, or whether its baseline funding,
the amount needed to keep an association’s reserves from going below zero,
or threshold funding, which is something between the two.
Bradley said standardizing the definition across the condo real estate
marketplaces was a good idea and that, furthermore, she supports a baseline
funding requirement.
Kuisle said he had conducted hundreds of SIRS for condo associations across
the state and that in July he had to start turning condo associations down
because he wouldn’t be able to conduct the SIRS in time — most were due Dec.
31.
Senate Majority Leader Jim Boyd asked Bradley whether the state would take
action against condo associations that did not’ complete the studies on
time, which Bradley said she was open to.
More meetings
Tuesday’s meeting was the first of many the Senate Regulated Industries
Committee will have on the issue.
Bradley maintained that not all the ripple effects of the law have been
negative. On the contrary, marketplace awareness of building safety and the
hefty special assessments condo owners are facing to make them safe now and
into the future is a good thing.
“That’s a good recognition of buyers in the state of Florida that every
condo owner should have that recognition and say, ‘I want to live in a safe
building. I’d like a building inspection. I’d like reserves in my unit that
that’s a very reasonable’ — a very rational thought process for anybody
who’s about to put their life savings into a condo, and we certainly
reinforce that in the law.”
It was a very interesting meeting of the Senate Committee
on Regulatory Industries with a very good panel of experts. If you live in a
condo and are affected by the provisions of
HB 1021
you should watch the video (1hour and 50 minutes) of the meeting. There are
lots of good explanations as to the meaning of the law and opinions of what
should be done to improve the laws. You will understand that the new law was
not intended to make owners pay all the cost at once, but there are
timelines provided. Make sure that all owners -- and especially board
members -- know the real meaning of the new laws.
CLICK HERE TO
WATCH THE FULL VIDEO OF THE MEETING!
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