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Comment by j1elo | Hacker News Reader

Not only that but we talk about the bait-and-switch that is common practice by some companies, and this reminded me of that too:

> When the building opened in late 2015, homeowners were required to spend $1,200 a year on [the building’s private Michelin-star level restaurant]; in 2021, that requirement jumps to $15,000, despite limited hours of operation because of the pandemic. And breakfast is no longer free.

Well, that sounds like quite the spike in service prices! Especially if it's a required expense.

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This is essentially the condo experience almost anywhere. You 'buy' a unit, and then it's a non-stop parade of rising fees and special assessments.

Can you explain how this happens to me as a non-american? I own an apartment in a multi apartment complex (so I guess that would be called a condo in the US?) and together with the other owners we have an association and we vote on stuff once a year, including anything that causes expenses. Is there some external party that makes these decisions in the US?

Many associations in America are managed by a third party. That association manager has a different incentive/goal versus the board which is to profit from the association. This is just the first level of disagreement.

It is similar in the US and the complaints usually come from people who purchased older condos where the original owners didn’t accrue enough for maintenance.

This happens in new or recently built condo buildings because they are aggressively marketing to potential buyers. The buildings are, often, cheaply made, go overboard on costly amenities, and made to maximize ROI for the builders/developers. They lure in buyers with low fees. Then, once the building is full, the buyers and the condo board discover that the quality of a lot of the materials and building is subpar, the amenities now need expensive repairs, or a lot of the building's charm is a bandaid to cover clear cost cutting. To fix all of these issues, the condo boards, usually made up of residents in the building, vote and raise fees in order to repair or correct these issues. This practice can make the cost of owning a condo sky-rocket in a very short time.

There is also the nightmare of insurance problems for a building.

The recommended move, in NA at least, is to look for older buildings with less amenities and a history of consistent condo fees that they will gladly give to you in a report if requested, which allows the potential buyer to get a clearer idea of the potential cost of owning a condo over time.

Yeah, this happens in Europe. In Spain, it is well known that most apartments built at around 2000-2009 tend to be of very poor quality. It's not uncommon that a building from 1995 is in better shape than another, more expensive, from 2005.

It didn't matter, because builders would sell them all "over the plan" (literal translation, not sure if that's an expression in English) i.e. even before having actually started building. People were buying like crazy, they needed the houses. Not sure why it got worse in the decade I mentioned, but there is a clearly perceived drop (albeit, this is just opinion based) in the price/qualities ratio. So once the developer had the money in their hands, why would they make more effort than the absolute minimum?

The solution is as you say, or litigation. My parent's condo board has recently won a years-long legal dispute and now the developer is forced to pay for all the repairs and improvements in the whole premise.

That's basically what a condo board is.

There are just a lot of condo boards, and a lot of them are 1) poorly managed, and 2) run by busy-bodies with their own agendas leading back to 1).

Same story as HOAs, really. Keep in mind that both have a selection bias, too -- well run neighborhoods or buildings don't generate controversy and lead to lawsuits or 6 paragraph screeds about how terrible they are.

Ah, it's the UK ground rent scandal, only for rich people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_rent#Ground_rent_scanda...

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